


and I ask you, friend, what's a fella to do?

by gutsforgarters



Series: knocking me out with those american thighs [1]
Category: Boondock Saints (Movies), The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - No Zombie Apocalypse, Crossover Pairings, Cunnilingus, Daddy Kink, Dirty Talk, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, First Time, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Older Man/Younger Woman, Possessive Behavior, Protectiveness, Semi-Public Sex, Smut, the author regrets nothing because her wife said so
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2020-03-22
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:49:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 36,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21875437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gutsforgarters/pseuds/gutsforgarters
Summary: Murphy's always been a stubborn bastard, but he thinks he might have finally met his match in the form of one Beth Greene, Georgia transplant and resolute Baptist.He doesn't mind theBaptistbit as much as he thought he would, anyway. After all, nobody's perfect.
Relationships: Beth Greene/Murphy MacManus
Series: knocking me out with those american thighs [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1647058
Comments: 83
Kudos: 117





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kattyshack](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kattyshack/gifts).



> For Maj, who enabled this lunacy and suggested the title, which is taken from Steve Earle's "The Galway Girl." You can listen to the playlist [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/55PrrAiYq32futQBiLEzNq?si=PrJpeEEERiOF8Nq992BLHQ). Now with an absolutely gorgeous accompanying [moodboard](https://dancemajicdance.tumblr.com/post/190007968774/and-i-ask-you-friend-whats-a-fella-to) by Maj ❤️
> 
> This fic is set several years after the events of the first movie, but disregards the second.

Some time ago—six or seven months, thereabouts—Doc got it into his head that the one thing McGinty’s was missing was a staff uniform. Said it made the lot of them look _unprofessional_ , coming into work wearing whatever they damn well pleased, so he went to one of his regulars—an art school dropout by the name of Dugan who always stinks of bourbon and patchouli and who has never, by all appearances, slept a day in his life—and commissioned a design for cheap. The final product eventually got slapped onto a cotton blend t-shirt, gold script scrawled across a rich green background because the colors go well together, and because that’s what Americans expect from an Irish pub.

Business hasn’t gone up since Doc rolled out his precious fucking t-shirts, but it hasn’t gone down, either, and isn’t that the best you can hope for in a shit economy like this one? Murphy likes the shirts, anyway, thinks the waitresses look cute in them, and none more so than Beth.

Just Beth, because even though he’s been pestering Doc to give him the girl’s surname for as long as she’s been working here, the crusty old bastard will only ever tell him to mind his own fucking business and keep his grubby godforsaken hands off the waitresses while he’s at it. He’s been calling her _Beth O’Hara_ in his head, anyway, ever since he first heard her talk in that honey-dipped drawl of hers.

Not that they’ve had as much opportunity to talk as he’d like. She’s been serving him warm beer and fried food for going on two months now, but they’ve never really had a proper conversation. She’s always polite, Beth, always sincerely friendly in a way that sticks out in a city like this one, but she always seems to be holding a part of herself back, too, and maybe it’s just professionalism that’s keeping her at a distance, but Murphy doesn’t reckon that’s it. Connor may be the brains of their outfit, might be the one to think before he acts—or shoots—but Murphy’s got good instincts, and he knows people. 

Would like to know _Beth_ in particular—in the Biblical sense, sure, that goes without saying, but in a fair few other ways, too.

Learning her last name would be a good start, but he doesn’t know how to ask without sounding like a creep, and Christ knows she has to fend off enough of those as it fucking is. Not that any of the sorry bastards would actually _try_ anything, mind, not with Murphy’s sharp eyes tracking their every move, and certainly not with his hand resting on the butt of his concealed weapon.

Beth’s the only one he’s tracking right now, though, as she swans through the densely packed Saturday night crowd bearing a varnished platter and a bright smile. Murphy sits up a bit straighter in his chair when he sees that smile, and Connor grins, leans over to nudge him pointedly in the ribs. Murphy pushes him out of his personal space, but Connor doesn’t seem to inclined to retaliate. No, the smug bastard’s content to carry on smirking like the godforsaken cat that ate the poor little canary.

“There’s your girl now,” he says, as if Murphy hasn’t got two seeing eyes in his head, and as if they hadn’t fixed on Beth the moment she stepped into his line of sight. Connor plants one elbow on the sticky tabletop, raises his voice to be heard over the hum of the crowd. “Are you finally going to man up and ask her for a drink while she’s here? I’ve got a bet riding on this, you see, and you know I hate to lose.”

 _Smug fuck_. Murphy kicks at him under the table, but Connor sees it coming and slides his legs to one side, still smiling that unbearable smile. Thwarted, Murphy slumps lower in his chair and goes digging for his squashed pack of Carroll's, because if he doesn’t find something to do with his hands, he’s sure to throttle his brother.

“Shut your fucking hole,” he grumbles. 

It’s fairly pathetic, as rejoinders go, but Murphy hasn’t the time to think up something wittier, because Beth’s finally squeezed through a narrow gap between two tables and is approaching theirs. Her hair looks freshly washed, coiled into a neat plait that hangs forward over one shoulder, and Murphy’s itching to wrap his hand around it, give it a gentle tug and point her pink mouth up toward his.

Christ, but her legs look endless in those tiny fucking shorts.

Murphy looks away from the freckles on her knees. Taps a cigarette out of the pack and sticks it between his teeth, flicks his lighter’s wheel. Takes a grounding lungful of tobacco smoke. He’s got to pull himself together, for Christ’s sweet sake. He’s carrying on like a hormone-addled virgin desperate to get his first handful of tit.

“Hey, y’all.” Beth unloads the basket of chips, and then the two pint glasses of Guinness Golden Ale. “Here’s your fries, and here’s your beer. There anythin’ else I can get you guys?”

“Yeah,” Murphy says, before Connor can open his fat mouth and make some sort of innuendo at his expense. “Keep the tap flowing for us, would you, love?” Murphy snaps his lighter shut and tucks it away, pulls out his wallet and counts out a tip for Beth. “Thanks, darling.”

Beth’s smile dims a bit, and Murphy thinks he knows why. Usually he’s the first one to start chattering at her, asking her how her day’s been and whether anybody’s been giving her any trouble. Right now he’s being almost curt with her, not because of anything _she’s_ done—Christ, no—but because Connor won’t stop fucking smirking at him over the lip of his glass.

Still, she tucks the empty platter under one arm and reaches out to accept her tip, and when her fingertips brush Murphy’s, he has to crush the mad impulse to snag her hand and tug her into his lap.

He wouldn’t, obviously, not unless she made it perfectly fucking clear that she wanted him to. But he can imagine it, vividly—she’s so fucking small, and she’d fit him so well, head tucked under his chin, arms slung around his waist while his rode low on her hips, tracing the line of his collarbone with the fingers that brushed his while he nursed his beer and laughed at Connor’s shit jokes and thought up ways to get her alone.

“Thanks.” Beth folds the short stack of bills in half and tucks them into her pocket. It’s more than she’s earned, but she’s long stopped protesting whenever Connor and Murphy overtip her, which is always; she’s attending one of the local universities, and Murphy imagines that she badly needs the money. “’Preciate it.”

Murphy nods, wraps his hand around his pint glass. He expects to be met with a smirk when he glances at his brother, but he’s not—he’s not met with any look at all, actually, because Connor’s frowning up at Beth, tapping her lightly on the wrist when she turns to leave.

“Alright there, sweetheart? You look dead on your feet—doesn’t she, Murph?”

She does, now that Connor’s pointed it out, and Murphy could fucking kick himself for not noticing sooner. He was too worked up over what Connor had said to pay much attention to anything save his own simmering temper, but Beth’s exhaustion is obvious to anyone who bothers to really look. She’s frightful pale—she’s fair skinned to start with, sure, but she’s usually got a healthy glow to her, and there’s nothing _healthy_ in how she looks under the pub’s dim but unforgiving lights—and her pretty eyes are bruised, haggard.

Jesus Christ, when was the last time this poor girl got any rest?

“I’m fine,” Beth says before Murphy can agree with his brother’s assessment, physically waving their off concern with a swipe of her hand. “I was up late studying last night, that’s all. I’m off for the next three days, so it’s all good.”

Murphy takes a drag off his cigarette, ashes it in the plastic tray that’s sitting at his elbow. Frowns up at Beth through a cloud of smoke. “Think you’re long overdue for a breather, girl. Go on, now, tell Doc you’re taking a break and sit down before you fall down.” 

“Could sit with us, if you’d like.” Connor kicks out one of their table’s unoccupied chairs and ignores Murphy’s sharp look. It’s not that he doesn’t want to spend more time with Beth; it’s just that he’d rather not do it under Connor’s gloating grin. “Come on, then, sweetheart. Have a seat, would you?” 

But Beth’s already shaking her head, plait flopping over her shoulder to disappear behind her back. “Oh, no, I couldn’t. My next break’s comin’ up soon, anyways. I’ll be fine till then.”

“Will you, now?” Murphy retorts, and Beth’s eyes latch onto his face, wide and a little startled. He takes another drag, hides his flushed cheeks behind a cloud of opaque smoke. “Go on, girl, sit the hell down. Doc won’t give a shit.”

Beth gnaws on the corner of her bottom lip, hugging the empty platter to her chest like a child’s security blanket. She looks as though she’s seriously considering the offer, and hope starts to stir in Murphy’s belly—because who does he think he’s fooling; he’ll take any amount of Connor’s shit if he gets Beth’s smile out of the deal—only to be immediately quashed when Beth shakes her head _no_ again.

“Nah.” This time, her smile’s closer to a grimace. “Sorry, y’all. Thanks for offerin’, but—just holler if you need anythin’, okay?”

“’Course, sweetheart,” Connor says, watching her pensively as she turns to go. He fixes that look on Murphy a second later, one eyebrow winging up.

“Been working quite a bit of overtime lately, hasn’t she?”

“Aye. Would have to check with Doc to know for certain, though.” And he _does_ intend to check with Doc, make no mistake about _that_. Doesn’t fucking care if he’s violating some sort of boundary, either, because the girl obviously doesn’t know what’s good for her.

Connor hums thoughtfully, takes a gulp of beer. Sets down his glass and wipes a smear of foam off his upper lip. “These damn schools. They’ll charge you a fee for breathing their air, they will.” 

“Greedy bastards,” says Murphy, and Connor tips his glass to that. They both take a swing; both wipe their mouths. Murphy ashes his cigarette and takes another drag. “Think she’d take our money?”

“Oh, absolutely not,” says Connor, and Murphy nods, because he'd already reckoned as much. “Girl’s got her pride, you know?”

Yeah, Murphy knows. He can respect it, too, but that doesn’t mean he has to like it. Not when it’s Beth, and not when Beth deserves better than what she’s got. “Could always leave an envelop of cash outside of her flat. Y’know, like a, what—” He snaps his fingers when it comes to him. “Like an anonymous benefactor, yeah?”

“Yeah, and she’d take it right to the police station, tell them there’s been a mistake and ask them if they can locate the owner for her.”

“If someone didn’t spot it before she did and steal it first,” Murphy says darkly, and Connor nods, resigned.

It’s not that Doc’s overworking her—old man’s too decent for that. It’s that she’s overworking _herself_ , Beth is. Her and that damn school of hers.

Not for the first time, Murphy wonders what a girl from the American south’s doing attending a university in Boston, Massachusetts. Sure, loads of kids attend school out of state, but to his hazy understanding, it’s not as common a practice as it used to be. Too fucking expensive.

“Fucking parking fees,” Murphy gripes, and stubs out his cigarette. At least Connor’s stopped taking the piss, but Murphy’d almost rather hear him go on about his _wee crush_ —Connor’s words, not his—than stew over just how fucking impossible it is to help someone who doesn’t want to be helped.

Girl’s so bloody stubborn, Murphy wouldn’t be surprised to learn that she’s got Irish blood running in her veins, after all. He really should ask her for her surname, see if his theory’s correct. Surely she won’t mind him asking.

Connor and Murphy drain their beers and pick at their chips over the next half hour, but it’s not Beth who swings by to top them off—it’s one of the other new hires, another blonde girl named Amy. Connor grins at her and flirts a bit, no real intent behind it, but Murphy frowns and cranes a look over her shoulder.

And, fuck it. Connor’ll get a kick out of this, but Murphy can’t muster up the wherewithal to care. “Is Beth taking a break, then?”

Amy sets down their drinks and retrieves their empty glasses. “Yeah. She might end up clocking off early, I dunno. I don’t think she’s feeling real well.”

Murphy’s stomach twists itself into a knot, and Connor frowns and asks, “Is she ill, then?”

“Nah, she’s not sick.” Amy sets their empty glasses on the platter and tucks a lock of hair behind her pierced ear. “Just going through it, y’know?”

No, as it happens, they _don’t_ bloody well know, because Beth gave them the fucking brush off. But Connor says, “Yeah,” and gives Amy her tip. “Thanks, sweetheart. Keep ’em coming, would you?”

“Sure.” Amy flashes them a parting smile and takes her leave, and Murphy fights to hold his tongue until she’s well out of earshot.

Once she is, he turns to Connor, props an elbow on the table, and says, “I’m gonna go check in on her.”

Connor leans back in his chair; talks around the cigarette he sticks between his teeth. “Settle down, there, mother hen. You can’t smother the girl; she won’t thank you for it.”

Oh, that’s a right fucking laugh— _Connor_ calling _him_ a mother hen. _Hff._ “Fuck off. Girl needs looking after. Far as we know, she hasn’t got anybody else.” Not in Boston, at least.

Connor takes a drag, exhales. Doesn’t speak up again till the smoke’s dissipated, as if he wants to treat Murphy to an unobstructed view of the meditative look on his face when he says, “And you reckon you’re what she needs, do you?”

Murphy shifts in his seat, this close to squirming. Sweet suffering Jesus, but he’s not nearly drunk enough to be talking about his fucking _feelings_. “Could be. And stop fucking looking at me like that, would you? Christ.”

Connor does not, predictably, stop looking at him like that. Instead, he ashes his cigarette and leans in, lowering his voice like he’s sharing a secret, barely audible over the buzz of the crowd and the crackle of the jukebox.

“Murph, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, here, but you’ve got all the emotional intelligence of a block of petrified wood, alright? Fucking the girl’s one thing, but if it’s, what—a _relationship_ you’re after, then I don’t think you’re suited to keeping her happy long term.”

Murphy forces out a scoff. “Who said anything about a fucking _relationship_ , then? I’m not shopping around for engagement rings, Christ.” He takes a swig of Guinness, then points a warning finger in Connor’s face. “And mind what you fucking say about her.”

Connor smirks, cigarette bobbing between his lips. “Not looking for a _relationship_ , are you?”

Just for that, Murphy could upend his pint glass over Connor’s stupid fucking _head_ , but he doesn’t want to waste good beer, so he drains his drink in one long gulp instead, not stopping to breathe until he’s finished. He sets the empty glass down hard enough to make Connor wince at the sharp ring of glass on wood, but not hard enough to shatter it and bring Doc’s wrath down on his sorry arse.

“I need to take a piss,” he mutters, and shoves back from the table. If he can’t meet Connor’s eyes while he does it, well, it’s just that he’ll swing a fist at the bastard’s smug face if he sees him smirk one more fucking time, and he’s not going to get into a barfight with his stupid fuck of a brother when he could be looking for Beth instead.

Connor stretches, folding his arms behind his head and propping his feet up on Murphy’s vacated seat. “Right. Give my best to Beth, then.”

Murphy flips up his middle finger. “Told you to shut your hole, didn’t I? Just for that, you’re paying the fucking tab.”

He storms off before Connor can open his mouth to protest, seeking out a head of blonde hair that’s not quite as bright as Beth’s and snagging Amy by the elbow. He leans in, speaking over the roar of a nearby table.

“Where’d you say Beth was?”

Amy _didn’t_ say, is the thing, but after blinking past her surprise, she rears up on her toes and half shouts, “In the kitchen!”

Murphy nods his thanks and moves on, shouldering through the maze of tables and bodies until it spits him out near the bar. Some big bastard he doesn’t recognize has taken over his usual stool, but he’ll just have to deal with that later, if at all. He nods at a few familiar faces, ignores the _Employees Only_ sign, and pushes into the kitchen.

He’s got a girl who needs looking after.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ringing in the New Year with pt. 2 of the fic no one asked for.

When Connor and Murphy first came to Boston, they’d pick up whatever odd jobs they could, and that included bussing tables at McGinty’s. Murphy’s done his time in the kitchen, is what he’s saying, scrubbing dirty plates and glasses till his hands turned red and cracked, but it’s been years since he had any reason to come back here. It’s largely unchanged, if his memory serves him, still small and narrow and warm, bare brick walls and a scuffed floor, no windows but a metal door leading to the alley out back, redolent with the smell of fried food and dish soap.

The latter’s currently overwhelmed the former, because Beth’s stood at the sink, tap turned to full blast as she twists a rag around the inside of a pint glass. She’s a waitress doing a busboy’s job— _Murphy’s_ old job—but Doc’s always pressed for an extra pair of helping hands, and it’s just like Beth to volunteer hers.

She’s a good Christian girl, Beth is. Murphy’s seen the delicate gold cross dangling from her neck, although it’s tucked under her shirt tonight. He spotted the thin chain earlier, circling her slender throat and disappearing into her collar.

He’s fairly certain she’s not Catholic, but that doesn’t bother him as much as he thought it would. Hell, she could be an avowed atheist, and he’d still want her.

She’s humming aimlessly under her breath, barely audible over the thunder of running water. Murphy stands back for a minute with his hands in his pockets, fingering at a growing hole in the denim while he listens his fill. While he looks his fill, too.

Her arse in those shorts. God fucking help him.

His eyes travel over the sweet curve of that arse and down her legs, stopping at her worn leather cowgirl boots. The corner of his mouth hikes up.

“Fine pair of boots you’ve got there, John Wayne.”

Beth’s shoulders shoot up toward her ears, then relax back into a slump. She doesn’t turn to face him, but he can see that her cheek’s bunched up in a smile.

“I oughta put a bell on you.” She sets the last plate in the drying rack and twists off the tap, then wipes off her hands on a checkered dishtowel. Turns, leans against the counter, crosses her arms beneath her breasts. She’s still smiling. “You and that brother of yours. Y’all’re sneakier than a pair’a barn cats.”

Barn cats, eh? Pissing and yowling and fucking and fighting—well. It’s not inaccurate. Hands still sunk in his pockets, he does some leaning of his own, up against the rough brick wall. Not near to Beth, but not very far from her, either, in a room this small. 

“Met loads of barn cats, have you?”

Her biceps flex when she shrugs. It takes quite a bit out of him not to openly stare. “Grew up on a farm.”

He’s not the least bit surprised. “That so? And what’s a farmgirl like you doing in a city like this?”

Beth’s face doesn’t close up, exactly, but her smile definitely fades. “You know why. College.”

“There weren’t any decent schools within driving distance of your farm, then?”

Beth chafes her hands against her arms like she’s trying to warm herself up—which doesn’t make a fuck of a load of sense, seeing as how stifling it is in here. “Yeah, there were. I guess…I guess I just didn’t wanna go to any’a them.”

He’s pushing—he damn well _knows_ he is, and she just might shut him out for his troubles, but, hell—maybe she won’t. Maybe she won’t, and maybe they’ll finally get somewhere. “Why not?”

Beth uncrosses her arms—that’s good; less defensive—but then she starts fiddling with the stack of colorful bracelets on her left wrist, and that’s not so good. She’s anxious. Possibly well on her way to _upset_.

How had Connor put it? _All the emotional intelligence of a block of wood?_ Shows what he knows.

“I just didn’t want to, okay?” She wraps her hand around her wrist. Squeezes. “What’re you doin’ here, anyway?”

How to word this without sounding like a fucking stalker? “Asked Amy where you’d gone. She said you were in here.”

Exasperation eclipses her anxiety. He can’t decide if that’s an improvement. “ _Why_? Ain’t exactly a party back here.”

“If it was a party I wanted, I’d’ve stayed up front.” He presses the flat of his foot to the brick and pushes off the wall, going up to Beth and leaning against the counter beside her, close enough for their arms to brush. “And what’re _you_ doing back here, then?”

Beth gestures mutely at the drying dishes, but Murphy’s not convinced.

“Is that all? Nothing else to it?”

She rolls her eyes like he’s getting on her last nerve, but she’s gone back to fiddling with her bracelets, too. “Does it matter?”

 _You matter_ , Murphy thinks, but he doesn’t say it out loud, no fucking way, because he doesn’t know how _to_ say it without sounding like a fucking pansy. Besides, he’s got other ways of showing he cares.

“Do I need to kick somebody’s arse?” Because he will, no question. Would probably do a fair bit more than _kick_ it, depending upon the severity of the offense.

 _That_ coaxes a laugh out of her, albeit a quiet one. “ _No_ , jeez. Anybody ever tell you that violence is never the answer?”

“Might’ve heard something along those lines a time or two, yeah.” That gets another laugh, louder this time. He nudges her, acting playful even though he’s dead fucking serious. “C’mon, sweetheart. I’m no priest, but your confession’s safe with me. Swear on my life it won’t leave this room.”

Beth looks him hard in the face, then turns her head, drops her chin. Blinks down at her John Wayne boots and sighs. It’s a mournful sound, and it makes Murphy want to tuck her into his side where he can keep her safe.

She’s an innocent. Whatever’s got her hurting, she doesn’t deserve it.

Eventually she says, “It’s stupid. I mean, I’m the one who made up my mind to leave, but I’m just—homesick, I guess.”

At a loss for what else to say—fuck, he’s useless at this shit—Murphy settles on, “What’re you on about, girl? Nothing stupid about it.”

She glances at him, then away, back to her boots. “D’you miss Ireland?”

Always. “Yeah. Sometimes. Not as often as I used to.”

“Y’ever feel like goin’ back? For good, I mean.”

He picks agitatedly at a hangnail. He liked this conversation better when it was _her_ feelings they were talking about.

“Sometimes,” he repeats. “You ever want to go back to—where’re you from, again?” South of the Mason-Dixon Line, yeah, that he already knows, but where specifically?

The corner of her mouth turns up. Murphy wishes he could call it a smile. “Senoia, Georgia.”

Murphy’s never heard of it, but then, as far as Georgia’s municipalities are concerned, he’s only passingly familiar with Atlanta and Savannah.

“Why’d you leave?” A variant of a question he’s already asked, but this is different. This time, he’s not framing it as a joke.

Instead of snapping back at him with another deflection like _I dunno, why’d you leave Ireland?_ she says, very quietly, “Just had to get away, I guess. Needed somethin’ different.” She laughs for the third time since he got here, but it sounds hollow. Forced. “And it doesn’t get much more _different_ from where I was than here.” 

Her choice of words isn’t lost on Murphy. _Had_ to get away. Not wanted to. Had to.

He shifts his weight, leaning farther into Beth’s personal space until their arms press flush together. She doesn’t move away. “Good different or bad different?”

“I’m not sure yet,” she says, and it’s her lack of certainty that convinces him she’s being honest. She looks at him again, then, forehead pleating into a thoughtful frown. “Why’re you always so nice to me? I mean—” She wrinkles her nose, and Murphy tries very, very hard not to get sidetracked by just how fucking adorable that is. “Okay, sometimes it sounds like you’re makin’ fun of me, but—” 

“Not making fun,” Murphy retorts, lips sliding into a smirk. “Just teasing.”

Beth huffs. “Yeah, I’m _sure_. Look, _the point is_ , when you aren’t doin’ _that_ , it’s like you go outta your way to be nice to me. You _and_ your brother. Why?”

Murphy uncrosses his arms and sticks his hands in his pockets like that’ll be enough to keep his baser impulses in check. Girl’s had a rough enough night as it is; she doesn’t need him salivating all over her on top of that. Even if she wanted him to, now’s not the fucking time.

That aside, she’s been honest with him to the point of making herself vulnerable. He reckons he owes her some honesty in turn, even if it makes him sound like a lovesick pussy.

“’Cause you deserve it.”

Beth’s face does something complicated, folding in on itself before going slack with surprise—lips parting, eyes flaring wide. The green of her shirt brings out the green in those eyes, flickering in and out of sight as she blinks and blinks.

“Oh,” she says, just that, but there’s a weight to it, like—he doesn’t fucking know, alright, but it’s almost like—

Like he’s given her something she never expected to have.

Murphy doesn’t see her reach for him—he doesn’t think he could look away from her face if the fucking Mob marched in here with their guns blazing—but he feels it when her fingers graze his wrist, like she’d be taking his hand if it weren’t in his pocket.

And he definitely sees it when she leans in.

She kisses him on the cheek. No, not on the cheek. On the corner of his mouth. Her vanilla Chapstick tracks a film across his stubble, thick and waxy, but her lips are hot and dry underneath that layer of artificial flavor, hot and dry and _soft_ , so fucking soft, holy _God_ —

She pulls away. Rocks back. Her fingers are wrapped around his wrist, and her thumb’s chafing at his pulse point like she’s trying to _soothe_ him, although he suspects, with what little brain function he’s retained, that she’s mostly doing it to soothe herself. She swallows, tight and nervous, and Murphy watches the pull of muscles in her throat like a carnivore intent on crushing her windpipe between its jaws.

“Um,” she says. “I—I’m sorry, I—”

Murphy doesn’t know what the _fuck_ she thinks she’s apologizing for, but he _is_ certain that he doesn’t care to hear it.

So he shuts her up in the only way he knows how. He yanks his hands out of his pockets, frames her face, drags his thumb across her lower lip, and pulls her into a kiss. A _proper_ kiss.

And for one second, one agonizing fucking second, he’s afraid he read her wrong, after all, that he’s gone and fucked it all up, but then Beth makes a noise that sounds like relief, snarls her fingers in his hair, and kisses him back.

_Thank Christ._

The fear fades, but the caution remains. He tries to make it sweet for her, he really fucking does; tries to take it slow, tries to ease them into it like slipping into a hot bath. He cups her jaw like it’s made of glass and kisses her as gently as he knows how, no rush, no thrusting his tongue into her warm wet mouth the way he’s been wanting to thrust his cock into her warm wet cunt; she’s so sweet and so young and so fucking _good_ , and no amount of penance would convince him to forgive himself if he frightened her off _now_ —

But then Beth’s fingers clench in his hair, hard enough to make his scalp sting and his eyes water, and her other hand pushes up his arm and grips him by the shoulder, tugging, turning, bringing them flush from chest to hip. Her nose bumps his cheek when she tilts her head and lashes her tongue across his lower lip, and there’s nothing at all _fearful_ in the way she digs into the meat of it with her sharp little teeth like she intends to eat him alive from the mouth down.

And, well. If it’s going to be like _that_.

He grabs a handful of that distracting fucking backside and gives it a good grope when he feels it clench in his grip, pushes his other hand up and under her shirt to scrape blunt nails over smooth warm skin and cup one firm tit—and, fuck him dry, but that’s her nipple coming up hard beneath his palm, because she’s not wearing a fucking bra.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, he’s gonna be hard for the rest of his life, and it’s going to be all her fucking fault.

“Jesus, Murphy.” She says his name like she says the Lord’s, like she’s praying to them both, and it makes his cock pound harder, has him rocking his hips against the firm curve of her stomach. She breaks off to pant against his jaw, sucks a stinging bruise beneath his ear. “Been wantin’ to do this for _weeks_ , why didn’t you try somethin’ _sooner_ —”

Why didn’t _he_ try anything sooner? What about her? If she’s been wanting him this badly, then why didn’t she fucking do something about it? He clutches her arse, guides her hips into a tight hot circuit, just about spontaneously fucking combusts when he thinks about how wet she must be getting right now, maybe even wet enough to soak through those little shorts.

“Would have,” he croaks, so hoarse he sounds fucking _ill_ , “if you’d just fucking said something, woman, _Christ_.”

How long could they have been fucking for? In how many ways could he have had her already, if they’d just pulled their heads out of their arses sooner?

Well. Looks like he’ll just have to make up for lost time.

So that’s what he sets about doing, sliding his hand out of her shirt to take her by her slim hips, lifting her up and around and pulling a shocked little huff out of her mouth when he plunks her down on the countertop beside the sink, well out of reach of the drying rack because no way in bloody hell is he going to knock the fucking thing over and bring half the pub stampeding in here with the noise. If anyone were to interrupt him and Beth right now, he’d almost certainly shoot them.

“Come here, sweetheart,” he murmurs, cupping her chin and bringing her mouth back to his, running his tongue across her swollen lower lip before thrusting it between her teeth. He wraps his other hand around her plaited hair the way he wanted to earlier and pushes into the warm space between her sprawling legs, lining up his cock with her cunt.

She arches into him and pants into the kiss, fingers snarling in his coat, his hair. Her breathing stutters, catches, when he thrusts against her, strong thighs tightening around his hips as if to draw him in closer even though they’re already as close as they can get.

Not _as_ close, actually.

He hooks his thumb against the dip of her chin to drag her lips farther apart, swallows her shaky sigh and shoves his hand between her arse and the countertop, hefts her up and gives the back of her thigh a firm slap.

“What d’you want, then, sweetheart?” He smooths his hand over her arse and under her shirt, slides it around to grope at a firm little tit, cock going even harder at the feel of _her_ coming up hard beneath his palm. “Tell me, now, go on. Want to make it good for you, girl.”

“You already are,” she says, the words bursting out of her mouth and breaking against his like she didn’t entirely mean to say them out loud. She tips back her head, panting, and he watches her face intently as he pushes his hips forward in a slow, hard thrust, gritting his teeth when her eyelids flutter and her mouth goes slack. Jesus, but she looks like he’s fucking her already. “God, Murphy, you are, just—just keep goin’, okay, _God_ —”

 _Oh, Christ._ He clamps down on her tit, then loosens his grip before he can hurt her, sliding his hand down her ribcage—too thin; she must not be eating as well as she should, and he’s _absolutely_ going to be doing something about that—and giving the dip of her waist an affectionate squeeze. He knocks her head farther back with a butt of his nose and sucks a bruise onto her throat to match the one she put on him, because it’s _him_ she’s begging not to stop and she’s _his_ now, and he wants everyone to fucking know it.

 _Keep going._ If he had his way, he’d have _her_ right here, fucking her wet and sloppy and bent over this counter while they violated every health code in the book—not that McGinty’s isn’t already violating its fair share of health codes without their help—but, really, he’d like to make it through the night _without_ killing anybody, if only because it would traumatize Beth, and the longer they stay put, the higher the chances of someone barging in on them grow.

“Can’t,” he mumbles around his mouthful of salty skin, and she whines, throat vibrating under the press of his teeth. He pulls off with one last lingering suck, lashes his tongue across the forming bruise. He thrusts his cock between her legs and hisses at the heat of her cunt that’s burning him up through their layers of denim, so fucking wet and so fucking close. “No lock on that door.”

She whines again, thwarted and a bit bratty, and doesn’t _that_ just make him want to take her over his knee and give her firm little arse a couple of smacks. Can’t right now, he’s in too much of a fucking hurry, but, Jesus, he’s gonna.

“Easy there, sweetheart.” Teeth on her neck, hard push of his tongue suctioning another bruise. She’s going to have a fucking rosary of the things by the time he’s through with her. “I’m not gonna leave you like this.”

But then her muscles lock up tight, and it’s not thwarted arousal that makes her voice come out high and panicky when she says, “Crap, no, I—I’m _workin’_ , Murphy, I can’t—”

“Fuck that,” he growls. Doc’s got other waitresses on his payroll, hasn’t he? The pub won’t descend into anarchy if one goes missing for a few minutes.

Or a few hours.

The noise Beth makes is half frustrated, half amused. “I’m gonna get _fired_ —”

“No, you aren’t. You’re going to meet me in the bathroom, is what you’re going to do.”

“I—what?”

“Got you addled, have I?” He smirks, then pinches her lightly on the bum when she rolls her eyes at him. “Bathroom’s got a door with a lock, doesn’t it?”

“I—yeah. Yeah, it does.” Beth licks her lips, and the only thing that stops Murphy from lunging in to suck her tongue into his mouth is that he’s trying to sort things out so he can fuck her already. “But ain’t that a little unsanitary?”

Murphy rocks back on his heels, makes a show of looking around the kitchen. “And this isn’t?”

Beth rolls her eyes again, but this time, she smiles when she does it. “Yeah, okay, I see your point.” She shoves her fingers through her hair and pushes it out of her face; it’s coming loose from her plait in pale wisps like the tufts of a dandelion. “Are you, um—are you sure you wanna—”

He snatches the words right out of her mouth, hand wrapped firmly ’round her chin to hold her still. “Crazy girl. ’Course I want to.”

“Well, jeez,” she huffs, “I was just makin’ _sure_.”

He’s grinning so hard it actually sort of hurts. “Don’t want to take advantage, do you?”

“Oh, shut up.” Beth swats at him, and he holds his hands up in surrender, stepping back so she can hop down from the counter. She tugs at the hem of her bunched-up shirt, tucks those flyaway strands of hair behind her ears. “How do I look?”

“Like you just got groped in a kitchen.”

She swats at him again, and he dodges, still grinning like a lunatic. And, well. She _does_ drive him mad.

She’s fiddling with her shirt again, but not to sort it out. This is all nerves. “So, um, how do we—”

“I’ll go first. Wait a few minutes, then follow me.”

Beth smirks, but there’s a nervous edge to it. “D’you want me to knock first?”

“S’pose you can, yeah.”

“And what if somebody’s already in there?”

“Then I’ll kindly ask them to leave.”

Beth crosses her arms, projecting flinty skepticism. “ _Kindly_ , huh?” 

She’s got him there. Murphy concedes her point with a careless shrug before darting in to steal another kiss, keeping it brief because he won’t be going anywhere if she keeps making those little wanting noises at him. He forces his hands off her and shoves them into his pockets, walking backward out of the room because he’s incapable of looking away from her and her flushed, smiling face until a physical barrier finally comes between them in the form of the door. 

He scrubs a hand down his face and swivels to face the pub, trying not to make it too obvious that he’s walking around with a hard-on as he heads past the bar and down the short corridor that leads to the loo. There’s only the one, a small room with a leaky sink and a toilet that only flushes half the time, but like he said, it’s got a working lock on the door and that’s all that matters.

Sweet Mother of God, but he’s finally going to fuck Beth. His pulse pounds harder in his ears—and his cock—just thinking about it.

Nobody waylays him, although a few of McGinty’s regulars stop to clap him hard on the back in passing. The back corridor is empty, so Murphy jiggles the bathroom’s doorknob—unlocked—then pushes inside and smacks the switch. The watery overhead light flickers on after a slight delay, and Murphy waits for his eyes to adjust before pulling his gun out of his waistband and setting it down on the toilet’s tank, because he doesn’t want to frighten Beth and he definitely doesn’t want to shoot either of them in the bum on accident. He shucks his coat and folds it up, drapes it over the gun, then props himself against one wall because no chance in hell is he sitting on that toilet seat.

He grows restless in under a minute, running his thumb up and down the length of his forefinger and wondering if he should bother lighting up. He’s the one who told her to wait a few minutes before following him to the toilet, but what if she changes her mind without him there to kiss her into delirium? Fuck, he’s an idiot; it’s just that he didn’t want everyone and their mother knowing his and Beth’s business, didn’t wanting anyone saying anything about her, because if they _did_ , he’d—

Someone taps lightly on the door before he can complete that thought, and then it’s swinging open before he can check that it’s Beth and not some drunk looking to have a piss.

But of course it’s Beth. Of fucking course it is.

She shoots him a nervous smile, then shuts and locks the door behind her. It looks as though she took the time to repair the damage he’d done to her plait, but he doesn’t know why she bothered, because he’s sure to wreck it again. Hell, he _intends_ to.

“So, uh.” She clasps her hands behind her back, so close in this tiny room—close enough for him to feel her breath on his face—but not yet touching him. “Come here often?”

He laughs a little wildly and reaches for her, drawing her into the curve of his body and wrapping his hand around that tidied plait of hers to coax her into another kiss. It’s a fucking hideous room they’re in, with a tile floor the color of pea soup and pitted, graffitied walls covered in stains he doesn’t want to know the origins of even if he can guess at them, and Beth deserves clean sheets and soft lighting, not _this_ fucking shithole, but Murphy’s selfish and greedy and lustful and he wants her _now_ ; he can’t fucking wait any longer.

He walks her backward and shoves her against the door because it’s cleaner than any of the walls, at least, hand coming up to cradle the delicate curve of her skull so she doesn’t bruise. He curves his other hand over her shoulder and pins her in place, and she clings to him and arches her hips, rubbing the mound of her cunt against the line of his cock.

 _Fuck._ More than anything, he wants to get _in_ that cunt, his cock or his tongue or even his fingers, he doesn’t fucking care which, so he drags his hand down her front and scratches a blunt nail over her inseam only to still when she takes his wrist. Is he going too fast? Does she want him to stop? Because he will, he’ll stop in his fucking _tracks_ if she so much as hints at not liking where this is going.

But she seems to like where they’re going just fine, because she doesn’t push his hand away. No, what she does is run her fingers over his tattoo, a light tickling caress that makes his skin tingle and his muscles twitch.

“ _Aequitas_ ,” she murmurs, mangling the pronunciation a bit.

He half smiles. “Yeah. It’s Latin.”

She rolls her eyes for the—fourth time tonight? He should keep a tally. “I know _that much_ , jeez.”

“Yeah?” He holds her eyes and pops her button, drags down her zip and takes his eyes off her face only to watch the quickening rise and fall of her chest. “What else d’you know, then?”

She drags her bottom lip between her teeth, drops her gaze. “Probably not as much as you,” she says, quiet and shy and so fucking uncertain, and Jesus. Jesus fucking Christ.

This fucking girl. This sweet, trusting girl.

He wants to be so good to this girl.

“That’s alright,” he says, and pulls her zip the rest of the way down. He can smell the wet musk of her cunt already, and it’s making him fucking salivate. “I’ll bet you’re a fast learner.”

Her mouth wobbles into a decidedly nervous smile, but it’s better than the anxious frown she was wearing a second ago. “So I’m told.”

His own smile widens. _There’s_ his brave girl. “And I’m a fair teacher,” he says, “or so I’m told.”

He pushes his hand down her gaping shorts, then, and cups her cunt through her knickers, hissing through his teeth even as she moans, high and shocked. Christ, she’s fucking scalding, and wet enough to soak through the cotton, _fuck_ , he can’t believe he’s the one who did this to her. She’s so sweet, so responsive that he could get down on his knees and weep from it.

He _does_ intend to get on his knees for her, at any rate.

For now, he watches her face while he touches her, one hand down her shorts and the other wrapped around her hip, fingers tracing the delicate curve of bone where it peeks up over her waistband. He pushes deeper between her legs, sliding down the fatty mound of her pubis to cup her where she’s hottest and rub damp clinging cotton against her lips, a slow tease that makes her forehead pinch and her breath stutter. Makes her hips jolt forward, seeking friction.

He’ll give her _friction_ , alright.

He pulls his hand out from between her legs only to push it past her knickers’ loose waistband, cupping her hot bare cunt before she can complain at the loss, fingering at her wet lips and nudging the heel of his palm against her hard clit. _Fuck_ , she feels so fucking good it’s making his eyes cross. He doesn’t think he’ll survive being inside of her, but what a way to go.

He presses his mouth to the full curve of her cheek, breathes hot and heavy in her ear. “This alright, sweetheart?”

She clenches up; his fingers aren’t in her yet, but he can feel her cunt fluttering against him. “Uh-huh.” Her nails bite into his back through his shirt. “Just—just don’t stop, okay?”

As if there were any chance of _that_. “Anything you want, darling.” He drags his fingers through the sticky mess that’s pooling between her lips, slicks up her clit and rolls it around like a bead. She hisses, sighs, pants. She seems to like what he’s doing to her, and he suspects she’ll like what he intends to do next even more.

He pulls away from her cunt with a soft squelch, kissing her pouting pink lips when she whines at him. Sticks his fingers in his mouth and sucks up the taste of her—Christ, even better than he imagined—and smiles when she blushes and covers her face with her hands.

“Ah, jeez, Murphy, _don’t_.”

“Why the hell not? Like the way you taste.” He slurps up the last dregs of her come and hooks his fingers in her waistband, thumbs poised against her pretty hipbones. “Lift your foot for me, huh?”

Her blush deepens from pink to red, spreading down her throat and bleeding into her collarbones, but she does as he asks, lifting one foot and then the other, allowing him to wrestle her shorts and knickers down her legs and over her boots. It’d would’ve been easier to just take the boots off first, but he doesn’t want her feet touching this nasty floor, and besides, he likes the thought of them digging into his back while he fucks her against that door until it rattles off its hinges.

He leaves her shorts and underwear in a crumpled heap off to one side and stays kneeling at her feet, licking his lips as his eyes track up her long bare legs—there’re those fucking freckles he couldn’t look away from earlier—and latch onto the short bush of her pubic hair. Blonde, but darker than the hair on her head, and damp with beads of come.

His undivided attention makes Beth squirm, and she curls a shielding hand over her crotch, but he clucks his tongue at her and cuffs her wrist, tugs it inexorably aside.

“None of that, now. Let me look at you, girl. Been thinking about this cunt for as long as I’ve known you.”

He suspects that might be the thing that finally gets him slapped clear across the face, but Beth just makes another one of those high sweet noises, legs falling farther apart, fingers curling around his. He smiles, gives her a reassuring squeeze.

He won’t let her regret this. That’s not a fucking option.

“That’s it.” He presses his nose against her and inhales through his open mouth. “That’s it, that’s my good girl.”

Her fingers catch in his hair; her thighs tremble against his face. “Murphy,” she says, and he has to grip himself through his jeans just from hearing her say his name like that. “You don’t—you don’t actually wanna—”

“Don’t wanna what?” He turns his face, rubs his cheek against her so her pubic hair rasps across his stubble, draws a patch of skin between his teeth and gives it a hard suck before releasing it with a pop. “Don’t wanna eat you till you cry? Think again, girl.”

“ _OhmyGod_ ,” Beth breathes, and Murphy grins and sucks another bruise onto her damp inner thigh, just far enough down on her leg that someone could spot it if she were wearing those criminally tiny shorts of hers.

And that, naturally, is exactly what he wants.

He sucks a third mark even lower down, right above her freckled knee—three for the Trinity; Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—then slicks his tongue up her thigh, feeling hard muscle jump under his mouth as her fingers tighten in his hair. She could tear it out by the roots and he wouldn’t give a fuck; hell, part of him _wants_ her to, just like he wants her to claw scars into his back with the bite of her pretty polished nails.

Murphy sits back on his haunches, unbuckling his belt and unzipping his jeans before hauling the leg he just marked up over his shoulder, holding firm when Beth sways. Her cunt’s tilted toward his face now, and he runs his tongue over his lips, opens his mouth to taste the thick wet smell of her that’s filling this cramped space like heavy perfume.

“Christ,” he grunts, shoving a hand down his shorts to grip himself ’round the base. _Fuck_ , he’s nearly as wet as she is, leaking at the tip and dripping down the shaft to pool between the cracks in his fingers. “You’ve got the prettiest cunt I’ve ever seen, girl.”

“ _OhGod_ ,” she says, high and shaky, taking the Lord’s name while Murphy’s sat on his knees before her like a penitent. Some might call it blasphemy, but Murphy would have to disagree. He’s read Song of Songs, and he thinks that this is as suitable a form of worship as any.

Anyway, he wasn’t just trying to rile her up when he said what he did about her cunt. She really is fucking gorgeous, pouty pink lips curling away from the dark mouth of her cunt like the swirled opening of a seashell and filmed over with a sheer layer of come, crowned by a sweet little clit that’s as nearly adorable as she is.

He could just stare at her for hours, _days_ , but saliva’s pooling up thick under his tongue, and he’s had enough of teasing them both, so he rocks forward onto his knees, covers her lips with his, and gives her a long firm lick.

He thinks she takes the Lord’s name in vain again, but he can’t be certain, can’t hear anything but his own drumming heartbeat over the sound of his satisfied groan. Some men don’t like the taste of girl come—some won’t even go down on their women, the bloody hypocrites, as if the lot of them aren’t constantly angling to get their skinny wee cocks sucked—but Murphy likes it just fine, especially when it’s dripping out of Beth’s perfect pink cunt. Thinks he’d sooner suck her off than fuck her, even, which is certainly say something, because he really, _desperately_ wants to fuck her. Needs to, even.

He hasn’t done this in a while—because the fact is that he hasn’t touched another woman since he met Beth; hasn’t fucking wanted to and probably couldn’t get it up for anyone else if he tried—but it’s like riding a bike, all muscle memory as he flexes his tongue and pushes it into that soaked little hollow. Even if his technique is lacking in finesse, he doubts Beth has anybody else to compare him to; not in this, at least. Doubts that any of her stupid, selfish, cornfed boyfriends would’ve even thought to do this for her.

He drags his tongue out of her cunt and flicks it over her clit. Feels her clutch at his head, his shoulders, the collar of his shirt as it twists in her grip. Her legs are quivering against his cheeks, but she’s not trying to ride his face—even if the tension in her hips suggests that it’s taking quite a bit of willpower to hold herself still.

Fuck that.

“Anybody else ever do this for you, sweetheart?” He turns his face against the thigh that’s slung over his shoulder, bites, licks. Jerks his hand up and down his cock. “Anyone else ever try to suck on this pretty little cunt?”

She doesn’t answer him, just moans helplessly—at the words or at the kitten lick he gives her clit, he doesn’t know. But he _wants_ an answer, so he slaps her lightly on the clit he just licked, grinning wildly when she squeaks.

“Asked you a question, girl.” He looks up the length of her body toward her flushed face, turned down to watch him even as she curls a hand over her eyes and peeks at him through her spread fingers. He thumbs her clit, and those fingers spasm. “You gonna answer it?”

“I—” Her hand slides down her face, covers her mouth and muffles what she says next. “No, no one’s ever— _God_ —no one’s ever done this to me before.”

“Didn’t know what they were fucking missing,” he says, and slides two fingers into her cunt, cock twitching in his fist at the way she blooms around him. He could come right this fucking instant just thinking about those muscles tightening up around his prick in a wet stranglehold. “Can’t say I’m sorry for ’em, though. I like having this cunt all to myself.”

He pushes his head between her thighs, suckles at her clit until her hips finally jerk forward, and hard enough to bruise his jaw. He pulls off with a slurp, fucks his fingers in and out of her, crooks them like he’s beckoning her orgasm to come forward. “And it’s all mine, isn’t it, girl? You’re not gonna let anybody else touch you after this, are you? G’on, fucking answer me.”

“Oh, _God_ —no, I don’t anyone else touchin’ me, I don’t, I don’t, God, Murphy, just, _please_ —”

 _Oh, fuck._ “I’ve got you, girl,” he says, right up against her twitching clit, panting hotly against her fanned-out cunt. “C’mon, sweetheart, you’re nearly there, can fucking feel it, c’mon—”

She says his name, garbled but still unquestionably _his_ , thigh clenching against his cheek, cunt clamping down around his fingers like a hungry mouth, and she shudders, whimpers, squirms. He’d bet anything her toes are flexing in her boots as she wavers, peaks, this close, _so close_ —

She comes. She fucking comes for him with a helpless little whine as she flexes hard and fast around his fingers, dripping all over his waiting tongue as he sucks on her cunt like he’s trying to draw juice out of a split peach, and, _fuck_ , he was trying to hold off but he can’t, he _fucking can’t_ , coming with a grunt and a shudder and making a fucking mess of his shorts.

Fuck. Fucking hell. He didn’t even get to watch her face while she came, was too caught up in unsuccessfully staving off his own orgasm to try. But he will, next time.

He’s going to make this girl come her brains out till her skull’s as hollow as a drum.

He fingers her through her aftershocks, nursing at her clit until she pushes at his head and whispers, “Please, please, it’s too much.” He pulls up his zip but doesn’t yet bother with his belt as he pushes to his feet, licking her come off his lip and watching in unrestrained awe as her eyes flutter open, dilated pupils overwhelming the blue of her irises like a solar eclipse.

To one side of her head is an ugly pockmark where someone put out a cigarette; to the other, the initials _DCR_ are carved into the woodgrain, thin and jagged. It ought to strike him as sordid, and it _does_ , but it also makes Beth look that much prettier by comparison, hair unwound from its plait, eyelids heavy and cheeks flushed splotchy pink.

She brushes trembling fingers over his cheek, skates her thumb across his lower lip. “Hey,” she says.

He grins, tips his forehead against hers. “Hey. Can I ask you something?”

“Uh—sure. Go ahead.”

“What’s your last name?”

His eyes are shut, but he doesn’t have to look at her face to feel her confusion. “My—wait, are you sayin’ I never told you?”

“No, you haven’t.”

“Oh. Well. It’s Greene. Beth Greene.”

Is it, now? He opens his eyes, cups her face in his hands—his fingers are sticky with come, but she doesn’t seem to mind—and butts his nose against hers. “Have you any family in Ireland, Miss Greene?”

“Uh, well, my great-grandfather was an Irish immigrant, so—probably? Why?”

Just confirming a suspicion. “No particular reason,” he says, and kisses the puzzled smile off her face.

 _Beth Greene_. He likes it even better than Beth O’Hara.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maj patiently tolerated all my relentless whining as I trudged through writing this chapter (and by "patiently tolerated" I mean "called me a punk and yelled at me to be kinder to myself") so if this ridiculous fic wasn't already dedicated to her, it would be now.

Murphy sits at the foot of Beth’s single-sized bed, listens to the sound of water running in the next room, and tries to convince himself that he isn’t nervous.

And he fucking _isn’t_ , mind you. It’s not _nerves_ that’s making his leg bounce like that, it’s—anticipation. Right. Fucking obviously. It’s only that he’s chomping at the bit to get inside of Beth—with his cock this time, although he absolutely intends to get his tongue up her cunt again as well—because never in his entire bloody life has he ever been _nervous_ over a fuck. Not since the first one, anyway.

Except Beth’s not just a fuck, is she? That’s the thing.

And that’s why he’s nervous.

 _Fuck_.

Murphy groans and scrubs his hands down his face, palms rasping over scruff in need of trimming. He grinds his knuckles against his eyeballs until bursts of color bleed across the insides of his lids, then drops his hands and lets them dangle between his knees as he surveys Beth’s room for the fifth time over since he sat down to wait while she used the loo.

Until tonight, he had no idea that Beth shared a flat with Amy and one other girl who’s apparently never home but who still pays her share of the rent, and by that same token, isn’t worth complaining about. That he didn’t know anything about this bothers him, just as not knowing her surname bothered him. He wants to know as much about her as he possibly can, and he resents each new revelation for proving his ignorance even as he exults in learning more.

And what has he learned from studying her bedroom? He’s learned that she’s tidy, not that he was expecting otherwise, because Beth’s not the sort to leave unwashed stacks of dinner plates and knee-high piles of underpants lying about. He’s also learned that she fancies the color blue, if her bedspread and dresser are any reliable indication. 

Most notably of all, he’s learned that she hasn’t had the time to stop and settle in since coming to Boston, because there’re almost no personal touches to speak of in here, and no framed pictures at all. Of course, that last bit might not mean a great deal of anything—it’s certainly not an absolute indicator that her family’s either dead or estranged—because Beth’s got to be in her late teens or early twenties, and people her age store all their photos in their mobile phones, anyway.

Still. It nags at him. Between the bare walls in this room and what she said earlier—about _having to get away_ —he can’t help but conclude that she must be running from something. Or someone.

Yeah. That much’s fucking obvious. It’s the why of it that he can’t stop chewing over.

The water shuts off, and Murphy sits up straighter, all thoughts but those concerned with getting his hands (and other body parts) on Beth fading instantly from his mind, if only temporarily. He debates shedding his shirt and unbuckling his belt—or would Beth rather do it for him? He took off his boots and socks while Beth was in the bathroom, anyway, as well as his coat and gun, and it’s all sat in a pile on top of her little blue dresser beside an unmarked cardboard box.

(Yeah, he poked through it while she was in the bathroom, and no, there was nothing particularly interesting inside of it. Balled-up socks, a couple of t-shirts—not even a pair of knickers. Not that he was hoping to take a pair home with him or anything. What is he, a fucking degenerate?)

His spiraling stream of consciousness grinds to a halt when the bedroom door eases open, and then quickly switches tracks when Beth walks in on light feet. She must’ve ditched her denim shorts in the bathroom, because her long legs are completely bare, the hem of her McGinty’s t-shirt flirting with the crotch of her knickers. Murphy rakes avaricious eyes over those endless legs and watches her cross them at the ankles when she shuts the door by leaning back against it.

Her hair’s loose and looks freshly brushed. Her smile’s shy, but her eyes are brighter than he’s ever seen them.

Fuck. He’s made her happy, hasn’t he? That’s something.

“Hi,” she says, still smiling, and his mouth slants into an answering smile, far less shy but no less pleased.

“Hey,” he says. “It’s about fucking time you finished up in there.”

Her smile blooms into a grin that bites at her cheeks and crinkles her eyes. The lights are off, but there’s a small, square window set in the east-facing wall, and the lights of South Boston are shining through it to spark in her hair and glint off her teeth.

“Missed me that bad, huh?”

The fucking cheek on this girl. “You know the answer to that question, sweetheart.” He taps his knee and motions her over with a jerk of his head. “Get over here.”

“Bossy,” she complains, wrinkling her little nose at him, but she doesn’t keep him waiting any longer; no, she pushes away from the door and comes over to stand between his spread legs, hands settling on his shoulders when his take her by the hips. “You could’a asked a little nicer, at least.”

“I am nice.” He cranes his neck to steal a kiss off her pouting pink mouth, grabbing two handfuls of her arse and pulling her flush with his chest. She whines softly when he breaks the kiss, but that whine melts into a contented little hum when he sets to kissing her throat instead, slicking his tongue down her chain of blossoming bruises and sucking at the crook where her neck meets her shoulder to make more. He breaks the seal of his mouth a few seconds later, but only so he can say, “You kept me waiting, girl.”

“You still complainin’ about that?” She hugs him tight—tight enough to fucking bruise, even, because, Jesus, those biceps aren’t just for show, are they? “I—I had to _pee_ , jeez.”

“Not what I fucking meant.” He presses his lips to her new bruise, then leans back and bunches the hem of her shirt in his fists. “C’mon, then, lift up.”

Contrary to his instructions, Beth plants her hands on her hips. “I’m not gonna apologize for finishin’ up my shift. I mean, it obviously didn’t kill you to wait another thirty minutes.”

“Thirty-five,” says Murphy immediately. Beth rolls her eyes at him, but he can tell from the way she’s pinching her lips together that she’s trying not to smile. “And I’m not about to waste another fucking minute. C’mon, arms up.”

“Yes, _sir_ ,” she says, voice lilting with sarcasm, and he’s only got about five seconds to process _that_ and how painfully hard it makes him before she’s finally doing what he asked and lifting her arms over her head. With effort, he forces himself back on track and rucks it up her stomach and over her head, at which point she takes over and throws it off, running her fingers through her mussed hair to brush away the crackle of static. She smooths it out, then flips it back behind her shoulders to give him an unobstructed look at her tits.

They look as perfect as they felt, pebbled in gooseflesh and crowned by puckered pink nipples—and, yeah, there’s her little golden cross dangling between them and shining in the light that filters through the window. He was going to take it off for her, but on second thought, he likes the contrast of warm yellow on creamy white. Pretty jewelry for pretty tits.

He says, “Christ, you’re fucking gorgeous,” and runs his hands up her soft stomach to cup her tits and give them an enthusiastic squeeze. He hefts them toward his mouth, wanting to feel her hard nipples against his tongue, but the uncertain tilt to Beth’s smile makes him hesitate.

“What is it?”

“They ain’t, uh—” She breaks eye contact and cross her arms over her tits, at once covering herself up and pushing his hands away. Murphy’s not pleased with either of those developments. “They ain’t too small for you?”

Too— _what_? Murphy just stares at her, mouth agape, and Beth flushes and squirms. Pity she’s not doing either of those things because of something he did to her. “Look,” she says. “Never mind. I’m sorry, I just—”

“They’re perfect,” Murphy tells her, because they fucking _are_ , and then, when she still looks doubtful, he says, “ _You’re_ fucking perfect, alright? And I could fucking kill any stupid little bastard who ever made you think otherwise.” 

Now _Beth’s_ the one who’s gawking, lips parted, tongue gleaming wetly between her teeth. He could be doing all sorts of things to and with that tongue, and instead he has to convince this gorgeous girl that there’s nothing wrong with the way she’s built. Not that he _minds_ doing it; it’s just that he wishes he didn’t have to. Someone like Beth should never have to doubt just how fucking beautiful she is.

If nothing else, he’d rather convince her with his hands than his words. Thinks it’d stick better that way and be loads more fun for the both of them, besides.

But then Beth’s lips close and form the sickle curve of a shy smile, and she uncrosses her arms to loop them around his neck, tits grazing his face.

And, well, fuck. _That’s_ a marked improvement if he’s ever fucking seen one.

“You’re a real sweet talker, Murphy, y’know that?”

“Only with you,” he promises her. She doesn’t look very convinced, and he can’t have _that_ , so he sets about convincing her with his body instead of his words the way he wanted to earlier, leaning forward to suck one of her perfect tits into his mouth, tonguing her nipple and then biting down just hard enough to leave behind the shallow impressions of teeth.

She grunts—at the sting or the suction or maybe both—and almost knees him in the fucking balls when she scrambles to straddle his lap. Doesn’t, which is a fucking relief, as _that_ would’ve put a damper on his plans right fucking quick. But then her strong thighs are hugging his hips, tit popping out of his mouth as she lowers herself down to seat her cunt against his cock, and he thinks he’d’ve probably forgiven her even if she _had_ shoved his sac up his throat, because, _Christ_ , that feels good. Still, he was in the middle of something, there.

“Hey.” He cups her firm bum and nudges his nose against her soft cheek. “Just what d’you think you’re doing, then? Wanted to suck your tits.”

Her breath hitches, like the filth he spews when he’s randy still shocks her a bit even though they’ve already gone one round together—but the way she shifts to drag her cunt up and down his cock suggests that she doesn’t actually _mind_ it.

“Wanted to kiss you,” she says from up close, lips moving against his so it’s something _like_ a kiss. “Got a problem with that?”

His cock twitches in his jeans, and not just because of what she’s doing with her hips. “Cheeky little thing,” he murmurs, and wraps her hair around his fist like a skein of wool, using the leverage to tug her back in and catch her daring mouth in a slick, filthy kiss.

He kisses her like he wants to fuck her, focused and intent and all fucking consuming, learning every inch of her mouth with slow, steady sweeps of his tongue and warming her up till she’s panting from it, till she’s fucking squirming in his lap like she’s already bouncing on his cock, and that’s when it hits him like a bullet between the eyes. How he wants to take her. Sat back on his knees, Beth’s long legs coiled around his waist so he can watch her tits jiggle and her cunt slide up and down his cock. So he can see her face when she comes.

Beth must have something a bit different in mind, though, because now she’s pushing at his shoulders, and, yeah, she’s got quite a bit of upper body strength stored in those distracting arms of hers, but he’s still twice her fucking size, and the only reason she gets him flat on his back as easily as she does is that she’s taken him by surprise.

That’s his story, anyway, and he’s sticking to it.

 _She_ looks terribly pleased with herself, anyway, glee so fucking infectious that it takes a Herculean effort on Murphy’s part not to break into an answering grin. Instead, he scowls and asks, “And just what the fuck d’you think you’re doing, then?”

She stretches out on top of him, plants her (sharp) elbows on his chest, and cups her chin in her hands. “Thought I’d give bossing _you_ around a try.” She chafes her toes against his ankle, and _his_ toes curl in response. For the second time, she asks him, “You got a problem with that?”

His cock strains against his zip, drooling in his shorts like Pavlov’s fucking dog at the ring of the dinner bell, so, no. Apparently, he _hasn’t_ got a problem with it.

_That being said._

“Actually—” He wraps his arms around her, braces his feet, and rolls them over, wrestling her onto her stomach and pinning her in place with one hand around her wrist and the other pressed to the small of her back before she can finish processing what just happened. He nips her ear, grins against her cheek. “I do.”

It’s not the whole truth. Obviously, he _doesn’t_ mind her _bossing him around_ a bit, but there’s a time and a place, and he’s already settled on what he intends to do with _this_ time and place.

Beth thrashes like a worm on a hook, and Murphy’s eyes cross when all that wriggling shoves her arse back against his cock. “Oh, c’mon, Murphy, that ain’t fair.”

He rubs his prickly cheek against her smooth shoulder in hopes of making her squirm harder because, _fuck_ , does all that friction feel good. “Don’t recall saying I gave a fuck about _fair_ , sweetheart.”

Beth turns her head to glare at him through one eye. To _glare_ , yes, but her cheek’s flushed, and her mouth’s slack and trembling, because sweet fucking Jesus, she _likes_ this. “You’re a jerk.”

He hums low in his throat and plants a string of wet, scratchy kisses along the delicate wing of her shoulder blade, tracing a small galaxy of freckles with the tip of his tongue. “Thought I was _sweet_.”

“Said you were a sweet _talker_. There’s a _difference_.” She punctuates that last word by slamming her hips back against his, almost hard enough to knock the fucking wind out of him, and he doesn’t even think it through when he retaliates by slapping her sharply on the arse.

Murphy knows what a gunshot sounds like, so he knows that this isn’t anything like _that_ , except it might as fucking well be. Beth tenses underneath of him, punching out a shocked breath, and Murphy tenses too, every muscle in his body clenching painfully tight as he wonders whether he crossed some sort of line. He smacked her on the thigh back at McGinty’s, but this is different—what if she doesn’t like it; what if he upset her; Christ, he’s been wanting to do it but he should’ve fucking _asked_ first, and what if—

What if every other thought but pleasing her drained out of his fucking skull like water through a sieve in the next instant in reaction to the noise she makes, confusion and want tangling up in a startled moan, eyelids fluttering shut and teeth digging into her lower lip as her hips push back against his cock, seeking out more, fucking _begging_ for more.

She hasn’t _got_ to beg, though, much as he’d like it if she did. All she ever has to do is tell him, _show_ him what she wants, and he’ll give it to her. She has to understand that. She fucking has to.

And now that the anxious knot in his chest’s unraveled, he doesn’t hesitate another second. He smooths his hand over the sweet curve of her arse, blunt nails catching on loose cotton threads, before hauling back and smacking her again.

This time, there’s no delay between her surprised jolt and her stuttering moan, and Murphy buries his face in the crook of her neck, wanting to feel the sound humming in her throat like a song. 

“You like that?” he asks, and nips at her rabbiting pulse. “You like that, sweetheart?”

 _Now_ there’s a delay, and he thinks he knows why. She’s embarrassed. Of course she’d be—sweet, innocent girl like her; depraved shit like this. Of course she’d feel as if she’s not allowed to want it.

But she’s got to understand this, too. She’s got to understand that this thing between them could only ever be _right_ , could only ever be holy. 

She’s his. She’s his to please and to look after, and he doesn’t want her feeling badly about liking the things she does.

So he kisses her cheek and dips his fingers between her legs to trace the shape of her lips through her knickers, kneading at her clit till she jerks and whimpers. “You’re allowed to, Beth. God, you’re allowed to like it. Fucking want you to like it, c’mon.”

She screws her eyes shut and brings her fist to her mouth, bites down on a knuckle, and for a moment, he’s absolutely fucking terrified that she’s going to cry, but she doesn’t.

What she does is nod.

What she does is give herself permission to like it.

Her eyes are still clamped shut, so Murphy’s fierce grin is lost on her, but that’s fine. He presses it to her cheek so she can feel it, says, “That’s a good girl,” and doesn’t let another fucking second go to waste. He pins her to the mattress, tips his forehead against the seashell curve of her skull, and gives her arse a tap, and then another, light and forgiving but still enough to turn her white skin red.

And, Jesus, but she takes it fucking beautifully now that she _has_ given herself permission to like it, gripping the pale blue bedspread like a lifeline and moaning openly, shamelessly, breath hitching with every successive smack, practically fucking sobbing with how good it must feel.

When he’s not smacking that firm curve of muscle and fat, he’s toying with her lips and feeling the cotton through which he’s touching her grow damp and then damper, clit coming up hard as a metal bead. It’s something like divine inspiration that compels him to smack her cunt instead of her arse on the next downswing, and the noise she makes in response is sweeter than any hymn sung by any earthly choir.

“Taking it so well, Beth.” He pushes up onto his knees so she has more room to cant her hips and spread her legs, so she can shove her upturned cunt at him like an offering and silently beg him to do what he just did again. “So fucking pretty like this, fucking knew you’d be. Such a good girl for me, aren’t you?”

Beth nods frantically, forehead braced against her clenched arm, legs twitching when he smacks her on the clit again. He hooks his fingers in her knickers’ waistband, snaps it against the dip of her back.

“Are you, then?” He cups her cunt and squeezes, then squeezes _himself_ when she rocks into his palm. “Tell me, Beth. Tell me you’re my good girl.”

She shakes her head, and he can’t tell if it’s in denial or if she just can’t find the words he wants. He pinches her clit anyway, gives her arse another slap.

“Not being so good now, are you? I ask you to do something, I expect you to fucking do it.” He grabs her underwear by the waistband again, drags it down so it catches beneath the globes of her arse and holds them up and out like halved pieces of fruit in a bowl. “G’on, sweetheart. Tell me you’re my good girl. Gonna make you come, I fucking swear, but you’ve gotta say it first.” 

“I’m—” Beth buries her face in the crook of her elbow, shuddering from head to foot. Murphy pushes his hand between the halves of her arse, drags his fingers through the sopping mess hanging off her lips, and, fuck, she feels so good, like warm sticky oil, and she’s only gonna get wetter when she comes. When he fucking _makes_ her come. “I’m your—I’m your good girl, Murphy, okay, _please_ , I’m good, I’ll be good, I wanna come, make me _come_.”

 _Jesus fucking Christ_. His eyes roll back in his head, his cock punches against his zip, and for one hot, dizzy moment, he swears to fucking God that he’s about to come untouched.

What the fuck has this girl _done_ to him?

“Yeah,” he says, voice coming out so raw it’d be embarrassing if he wasn’t focused on getting Beth off. He shoves his hand deeper between her spread, shaking legs, slicking his fingers through sweat and come till he finds her clit. “Yeah, sweetheart, you can come, c’mon. Wanna feel it, Beth, fucking give it to me.”

And she does. God, _Jesus_ , she fucking does, back bowing, fingers clenching, thighs squeezing his hand so hard it’s a miracle it doesn’t break. He fingers her through it, can’t seem to bring himself to stop touching her till she whimpers from the overstimulation and shakes her head _no_. Too much.

He spreads himself out on top of her and kisses her throat, her cheek, the loose corner of her mouth. Pulls his hand out from between her legs—and she doesn’t make it easy on him; they’re still clenched tight—and licks her come off his pruned fingers.

“That was good, sweetheart.” He wraps his sticky fingers around her chin and pulls her into a lingering kiss. “You did so fucking well, Beth.”

She gives a pleased little hum, long lashes grazing his cheeks, and hooks her hand around his wrist to hold him back.

He breaks the kiss, saliva trailing from his lips to hers, and sits up to straddle her hips. The shape of his rosary’s pressed into her skin—the crucifix, a few of the beads—and he runs his fingers over it, smiling when her muscles twitch.

He climbs off the bed and onto his feet, giving Beth’s bum a light tap when she makes a protesting noise. He pulls his wallet out of his back pocket and tosses it onto the bed, then strips out of his clothes—all but shuddering with relief when his zip’s teeth part around the jut of his cock—and comes back to her. She’s turned herself over, pushing up on her elbows to watch him with wide, avid eyes that keep dropping below his waist and then darting away as if she’s embarrassed to’ve been caught staring.

Christ, she’s adorable.

She also looks fucking _debauched_ , and his cock throbs like a bruise at the picture she makes, loose hair a wreck, long legs parted and covered in hickeys, feet still twitching with the aftershocks of the orgasm he just gave her. That’s two so far, isn’t it?

He wants to give her a third before the night is through. At the fucking _least_.

He drags her knickers down her legs, stops for a second to take in the sight of her puffy pink cunt peeking out at him through her wiry pubic hair, then grabs his wallet and goes rooting for a condom. He finds one, only to swear ardently when he tears too far down the wrapper in his haste to get inside of Beth. She giggles at his expense, and he spares a moment to slap her on the thigh before checking that he didn’t, in fact, destroy the only condom he’s got on hand.

No. Yeah. They’re fine.

_Thank fucking Christ._

Murphy thumbs back his foreskin and tugs the latex into place around his shaft, and Beth hooks her legs around his waist, heels knocking into his thighs. He grips himself around the base and shuffles forward on his knees, smoothing his other hand down Beth’s trembling abdomen to cup her cunt and peel her wet lips apart. She’s shaking all over, but not, he thinks, with nerves. Or at least not mostly.

No. That’s sheer fucking anticipation that’s sparking in her bright blue eyes.

Still, he’s got to check. He’d fucking castrate himself with his own knife before he ever did anything she didn’t desperately and enthusiastically _want_ him to do. “Alright, sweetheart?”

Her thighs jump against his hips when she nudges a fingertip against her swollen clit. “Uh-huh.” A bit of that earlier bravado returns, coaxing her lips into a small but genuine smirk. “So why don’t you hurry up an’ fuck me already?”

Murphy’s mouth pops open, cock jerking in his hand. Jesus. Jesus fucking merciful Christ. He might’ve denied it earlier when Connor accused him of wanting a _relationship_ , but, fuck. Just _fuck him_ , but he thinks he might be in love with her, after all. His heart always clenches like a fist whenever she’s around, anyway, and that’s what love’s _supposed_ to feel like, isn’t it? Probably, but he doesn’t fucking know for certain because he’s never _felt it before_.

He’ll mull it over later. Much, much later when his cock’s not hard enough to hammer nails and when he hasn’t got Beth Greene spread out like a virgin sacrifice beneath him. Right now, he forces his gaping mouth shut and taps his shaft against her clit, cockhead bumping her flexing fingers, and takes his own turn at smirking when she grunts and shudders.

“Got quite the fucking mouth on you.” He slaps his cock against her clit again, harder this time, and her eyelids flutter shut, heels digging into his arse. “S’pose I’ll just have to find a way of shutting you up, won’t I, sweetheart?”

She opens her eyes and wraps her hands around his hips. Smiles. “You can go ahead an’ _try_ , Mr. MacManus.”

Yeah. Jesus. He’s definitely in love with her.

“Never turned down a dare,” he says, praying that she’ll attribute the shakiness in his voice to anticipation—and she wouldn’t be entirely wrong if she did. Her lips clench when he grabs her thigh and pushes it back so her cunt’s tilted toward his cock, then clench again when he smooths the head down her clit and notches himself against her opening.

“Easy, now,” he says, rocking shallowly against her but not quite pushing inside, not just yet. She may not be a virgin, but she said for herself that she’s as good as, and she’s so fucking small, besides. “Easy, darling, that’s it. Open up for me, sweetheart, g’on. Just relax for me, alright?”

“ _Am_ relaxed,” she mumbles, but she digs her nails into his hips and screws her eyes shut as she does the exact opposite of what he asked her to do, tensing all over from her jaw to her cunt, and for a moment, Murphy thinks that he’ll need to loosen her up a bit more with his fingers before carrying on. But then she _does_ relax, so abruptly that it takes him by surprise, and he slides halfway in before forcing himself to hold the fuck still.

“ _Christ_ ,” he says through clenched teeth, shuddering with the effort it takes to _not_ fuck her brainless before she’s ready for it. She’s making it hard on him, though, sticky cunt gripping him like a fist and clamping down even tighter when his hips unconsciously rock. “You’re so fucking tight, Beth, I can’t— _fuck_.”

“It’s okay,” she tells him, even though she sounds winded, even though she’s fucking trembling again. “It’s okay, Murphy, I’m fine. Keep—keep goin’, alright?”

 _Keep going_. He doesn’t think he could do anything _but_ unless she outright _told_ him to stop. Still, he fumbles for her hand, wraps her fingers around the base of his shaft. “Just—keep your hand right there, alright? Don’t fucking move it till I tell you to.”

Her forehead scrunches, but then understanding dawns on her face, and her flush deepens. She nods, and she doesn’t drop her hand once he’s let it go. “Okay. Okay, keep goin’.”

He does. _Jesus_ , he does. She’s tight enough that he can feel the pressure like a stone on his chest, but she’s also _wet_ , come waterfalling out of her cunt to rain all over his cock, and that helps. Helps so well he practically falls those last few inches into her before her hand butts up against her cunt and stops him from going any further.

“Alright?” he asks, and she nods.

“Yeah, I—” Her thighs squeeze his hips, her cunt squeezes his cock, and her wobbling smile squeezes his heart in a fucking death grip. “I’m fine, Murphy; just keep goin’ and _fuck_ me.”

And she’s got the nerve to call _him_ bossy? “What’d I tell you about that mouth?” he asks her, but he’s smiling, too, a smile that slides right off his face a second later when he does as she told him to, when he eases out of her and fucks back in, when he sets a steady pace that gradually builds to a teeth-rattling rhythm.

 _Fuck_. He knew she was going to feel like heaven, only it turns out he had no fucking idea what heaven felt like, because no amount of fantasizing could’ve ever prepared him for _this_.

And if he thought the noises she made when he ate her out and spanked her arse were good, even they don’t hold a candle to the sounds she makes when he’s inside her, hitched moans that stutter in time to the pace he’s fucking her to, whimpering little cries that he’d mistake for ones of pain if not for the way she vises around him on every downstroke, like she’s trying to keep him in place, keep him with her.

Christ, does he want that, too.

“Been wanting to fuck you for so long, Beth.” It tears out of him like a confession, because that’s what it fucking _is_ , except there’s no shame in it, no appeal for forgiveness, because why the fuck should there be? His fingers dig into her thighs, and hers clench around his cock. “Could fuck you for hours and you’d let me, wouldn’t you?”

Her back arches, and her fingers loosen their grip on his shaft even as her cunt ripples around him, but even if they slipped off entirely, he doesn’t think that’d be a problem. Not with how soaking wet she is, how open, loosening up and inviting him in. _Fuck_ , but she was made for him, wasn’t she?

He smacks her on the clit when she doesn’t answer his question, and she seizes up, cunt spasming for all of a second before going loose again, and, fuck, but the thinks she might’ve come just then, just a little, and all just because of one tap from him.

“Asked you a question, didn’t I?” He pulls her thighs further around his waist, hikes her hips up higher so only her head and shoulders are touching the bed. He swipes his thumb over her clit, short hard passes meant to coax another one of those rippling spasms out of her. “Tell me you’d let me, Beth, c’mon.”

“Yeah, I’d—” Her fingers knock his thumb out of the way, and she rubs at herself faster than he did, harder, brushing up against his cock on every pass. “Y’know I would, Murphy, _Jesus_.”

“That’s a good girl,” he says, just as breathless as she is, hot pressure coiling at the base of his spine as her legs coil tighter around his waist. He wants to watch his cock piston in and out of her, wants to see the strain of her lips around his shaft, but he can’t bring himself to look away from her face. “All mine, aren’t you? G’on, fucking say it.”

She said as much earlier in the bathroom at McGinty’s, admitted that she didn’t want anyone but him touching her, but, fuck, that wasn’t good enough; he needs _more_. He needs all of her.

Except she’s shaking her head, and he doesn’t think it’s in denial, thinks she’s just fumbling for words again, but the gesture still hits him like a sucker punch to the gut, and he’s wrapping a hand around her shoulder before he can entirely process what the fuck he’s doing, folding her into him and walking forward on his knees to pin her to the rattling headboard, and then _her_ hand drops and he sinks all the way into her with a filthy wet squelch that he’ll be hearing in his dreams for the rest of his fucking life.

“You’re mine, girl.” He licks a dirty stripe up her neck, buries his mouth in the soft, vulnerable hollow beneath her ear and sucks another bruise onto her skin because, fuck, he needs her to look in the mirror when this is over and remember that _he_ was the one who did these things to her. “Y’know you are. Say it, c’mon.”

“I— _oooh, God_ —” Her nails bite into his shoulders, because he hit her too deep or because he’s thumbing at her clit again, he doesn’t know. His rosary catches on her cross and hooks itself in place, tying them together. “I’m yours, I’m yours, just let me—oh, Jesus, I wanna—”

He presses a fierce grin into the crook of her neck and shoulder, hips working so hard he knows they’ll be sore afterwards, and he gives her what she asked for, what she needs from him, just him. He makes her come, makes her come sobbing all over his _cock_ , and he doesn’t last for much longer in the wake of it, but that’s fine. He gave her what she needed, and that’s all he could fucking ask for.

They stay slumped against the headboard as they come down panting until Beth squirms and pushes at his shoulders and complains about her aching back. He untangles his rosary from her necklace, lets her down, and climbs out of bed to dispose of the used condom, tying it off and throwing it in the bin before coming back to Beth, who’s wormed her way under the blankets.

She blinks sleepily up at him when he nudges at her to make room. “Budge over.”

“Still bossy,” she mumbles, but she melts into him when he spoons up behind her. He rubs his cheek against her shoulder, plants a line of lazy kisses along her throat, and she giggles and squirms a bit more. 

“I should prob’ly get up an’ go to the bathroom in a minute,” she mumbles, but from the way she tangles her fingers with his, he doesn’t think she’s in any particular hurry. She squeezes his hand, skates her thumb across his knuckles. “You wanna, uh. You wanna stay the night?”

Is there a way of saying yes that won’t make him sound like an overeager twat? He decides that there isn’t, and that he doesn’t really give a fuck, besides. “Yeah.” He kisses her cheek because, fuck, he can’t seem to keep his lips away from her. “Got any plans for tomorrow?”

“Thought I’d go grocery shopping, but other’n that, not really.” She rolls onto her back, and he shifts over to make room, propping himself up on one elbow to watch her face. “Why?”

He traces a finger over one of the hickeys he gave her. Shrugs. “Thought you might want to come to mass with me." 

Her lips part in surprise, then soften into a smile. She cups his face in one hand and ruffles her fingers through his stubble. “I’d like that,” she murmurs. “I haven’t been to church in a while, and I miss it.” Her smile turns a little wry. “But, uh. Y’know I’m not Catholic, right?”

His mouth hikes up at the corners. He cups her breast, not for a grope, but because he wants to feel her heartbeat. Tangles his fingers in her cross’s chain. “Nobody’s perfect.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Take note of the newest tag, and don't say I didn't warn you, alright. We're diving deeeep into the dumpster here, folks. 
> 
> (But seriously, thank y'all so much for your warm response to this bonkers crackfic. You are all my treasures ❤️)

Murphy grumbles to himself and rolls over onto his stomach, half awake and irritable. The irritability’s nothing new; to say that he’s not a graceful riser is to say that the Arctic Ocean’s a bit chilly. Still, he could’ve sworn that his mattress back home was a sight more comfortable than whatever it is he’s lying on right now, and although this morning wouldn’t be his first waking up in a stranger’s bed, he’s sure as fuck not looking forward to climbing out the bathroom window and down the nearest fire escape—

_We were halfway there when the rain came down  
Of a day-I-ay-I-ay  
She asked me up to her flat downtown  
Of a fine soft day-I-ay-I-ay_

What the fuck?

The sound of singing startles him the rest of the way awake, and he shoves one arm under the flat pillow to grope for a gun that’s not there because he left it on the dresser— _Beth’s_ dresser, because he went home with Beth last night.

Holy Mary Mother of God, _he went home with Beth last night_.

He drops back down with a groan that he smothers in the pillow, because now that he remembers where he is and _who_ he’s with—now that he’s got Beth’s sweet voice ringing in his ears again—he can’t and _won’t_ stop the flood of sense memory that tightens his skin and aggravates his morning wood.

He remembers the plush give of Beth’s arse beneath his palm, and his fingers twitch; he recalls the taste and feel of her cunt, and his mouth waters; he thinks of fucking her up against this headboard, and _Christ Almighty_ , his cock twitches and throbs and leaks pre-come all over the fitted sheet.

He rolls his cheek against the pillow and peels one eye open, searching for Beth and failing to find her. She must be by the dresser, then, out of his line of sight—but not out of his range of hearing. Christ, she’s got a lovely singing voice, sweet as a peach and clear as a bell, and he wonders if he could persuade her into singing for him, specifically. Of course, there’s always the chance that she’d be shy about it—she was humming under her breath last night, but she stopped when she realized she had company, and she probably thinks he’s asleep right now.

_And I ask you, friend, what's a fella to do?  
'Cause her hair was black and her eyes were blue_

Even as Beth sings the words, Murphy privately substitutes _blonde_ for _black_. The lyrics are half right, anyway—he never stood a chance in hell against those blue eyes of hers.

Her singing tapers off into humming after another moment, and Murphy reckons that now’s as good a time as any to pretend to wake up. He makes a point of yawning audibly, smirking to himself when Beth’s humming cuts out, then rolls onto his back and sits up with an exaggerated stretch. He blinks his eyes open and grins muzzily at Beth, who’s stood by the dresser as he’d originally guessed, in the middle of doing up her jeans’ zip.

Now that’s a right fucking shame. What’s she getting dressed for, anyway? He wasn’t through with her yet.

Knows for a fucking fact that he won’t ever be, not for as long as she’ll have him.

“Hey, there,” she says, flashing him a rather shy smile. She pulls her zip the rest of the way up, twists an elastic band off her wrist, and starts scraping her hair into a high ponytail. “It’s about time you woke up, lazybones. Thought you were gonna sleep the whole dang mornin’ away.”

Murphy squints at the digital clock, then scoffs. “What on God’s green earth are you talking about, woman? It’s only seven in the fucking morning, for Christ’s sake.”

Beth smooths out her ponytail, then crosses her arms in front of her breasts. “Closer to eight now, actually. You’re s’posed to round it up.”

Murphy lies back down and folds his arms beneath his head, talking around a jaw-cracking yawn. “Is that right, Professor?”

He can’t see Beth from this angle, but he can hear the smile in her voice when she says, “Yeah, that’s right. Y’oughta pay attention. There might be a pop quiz later.”

 _Cheeky_. He lifts his head off his arms, and upon finding that she hasn’t moved an inch from her spot by the dresser, jerks his chin and says, “C’mere.”

Beth props her hands on her hips and regards him with deep suspicion, which would be insulting if it wasn’t entirely justified. “Uh-uh. I know what you’re after, mister, and you ain’t gettin’ it. I don’t wanna be late to mass.”

So she still wants to go with him, does she? He hadn’t even realized he was feeling anxious over that until she put his doubts to rest.

Sweet merciful Christ, if he’d known that this love business would feel like nothing so much as one extended panic attack, he’d’ve fought harder against it. Of course, in order to fight it, he would’ve had to’ve been aware that it was happening at all. Bloody thing fucking sucker punched him before he’d even had a chance to brace himself for the impact.

What were they talking about, again?

Oh, right.

“ _Pfft_.” He flops back down and stretches till his spine pops, toes flexing against the shit mattress. “They hold it several times a day, girl, didn’t you know that?”

“No, I didn’t. Not a Catholic, remember?”

Murphy tightens his abdomen and sits back up, flinging the sheets aside and huffing a laugh when Beth blushes and averts her eyes. You’d think she’d never seen it before, the way she’s acting.

“Well, now,” he says, solemnly enough that Beth starts to frown well before he’s finished talking, “there _is_ a cure for that.”

Beth rolls her eyes. “No, thanks. I dunno what the Pope’s been tellin’ you, but Protestantism ain’t actually a disease.” She drops her gaze and plucks at her jeans, and now that Murphy looks at them properly, he sees that they’re a bit frayed around the edges. Would she object to him buying her a few new pairs? Probably, but that doesn’t mean he won’t try.

“Are these, uh. Will these do? For mass, I mean. I didn’t really bring any nice church clothes with me, so…”

He swallows the lump that tries to rise in his throat. He says, “It’s fine, sweetheart,” and Beth raises her head to look up at him from under her lashes, still toying with her jeans. “I wear my jeans to church all the time.”

One corner of her mouth pulls up. “Really?”

“Would I lie to you?” he asks, and she shakes her head, the other corner of her mouth twitching into a reluctant smile. He raises a hand, beckoning for her. “Now come the fuck over here. I’d like to get a bit of last-minute sinning in before Father Brady washes it all away.”

“Real charming,” Beth says dryly, but she comes to him now just as she came to him last night, because she’s a good girl, and because she knows fucking well he’ll make it worth her while. She sets one knee on the edge of the mattress and braces her hands against his shoulders, and the wispy ends of her ponytail tickle his cheek when she leans in for a kiss.

No sooner have her lips brushed his than he’s sliding his hands around her waist and pulling her the rest of the way down, pinning her to his chest and rolling them over so it’s _him_ who’s on top of _her_. She giggles, startled and breathless, but that giggle turns to a moan when he slicks his tongue up her neck, tasting soap.

She must’ve had a shower while he was asleep, and he’s a bit miffed that she didn’t wake him and ask him to join her. Getting his hands on a wet, soapy Beth almost certainly would’ve been enough to change his outlook on mornings.

“You— _ungh_.” Her thigh twitches against his hip, fingers snagging in his hair and rounded nails biting into his scalp when he closes his lips around his tongue and sucks a fresh bruise onto her warm, clean skin. “You always gotta be on top?”

He pulls off her neck with a pop and rolls his tongue across his lips, chasing the taste of salty skin and vanilla soap. The pink in Beth’s cheeks is an exact match for the jumper she’s wearing, and that color deepens when he grins at her, open mouthed and wolfish.

“Nah,” he says, pushing his hips against her belly. “Like it all sorts of ways.”

Her jumper’s nearly as soft as her skin is, but he still prefers her naked, and he’s quick to ruck it up around her tits. She’s wearing a bra today—a fucking pity, that—and he shoves a hand under it, fingertips bumping up against her cross, the tip of his nose nudging the curve of her cheek.

“C’mon, then.” He gives her tit a firm squeeze, and she moans right up against his ear, nipple puckering beneath his palm. “Come to Daddy, sweetheart.”

Beth goes still for a moment, but then she giggles, albeit a bit nervously. “ _Daddy_ , huh? Never been with a guy who wanted me to call him _that_ before.”

Irritation hits him like a dart between the eyes, and he pushes up on his elbows to scowl at her. “Yeah, well, you’re with _me_ now, aren’t you?”

Because that’s all that matters. All that _should_ matter, and, fuck him, but why the fuck is he jealous of men—boys, probably—who aren’t even in her life any longer?

She’s his girl now. All his. She told him so, and he believes her, because Beth’s no fucking liar.

Her lips form a curious little smile that he can’t quite read. She runs her fingers down his cheek, through his stubble, and his scowl softens and fades under her touch.

“Yeah,” she murmurs, fingertips glancing off his lower lip. “Guess I am.”

She _guesses_? Murphy’s scowl returns with a vengeance, but it doesn’t stick. He lowers himself back down, running his body flush along the length of hers, and sweeps his thumb across her stiff nipple. Her breath catches, and he presses his grinning mouth to her cheek.

“Thought you wanted to be my good girl,” he says, hot and close, and her breath hitches again, heart beating like a bodhrán beneath his palm.

Oh, Christ, she’s fucking perfect. It’s not the first time he’s said it or thought it, but he knows for fucking certain that it won’t be the last. 

She rakes her nails lightly down his back, making his muscles twitch and his toes curl, before cupping his bare arse in both hands and urging him to roll his hips against her belly. As if he needs the encouragement, as if he needs to be _coaxed_ into rutting his cock against her clenching abdomen, but he’s not about to complain. He might not be as clever as Connor, but he’s not a fucking idiot, either, and far fucking be it from him to deny the girl a good grope.

“Guess I do,” she admits after a moment of mindless grinding, panting through her smile, thighs closing tight around his hips. “ _Daddy_.”

 _Oh, fuck._ He crushes his lips to hers, crushes her body into the mattress, practically fucking smothers her with the weight of his need for her. And if she voiced a single word of complaint, if she so much as squeaked her discomfort, he’d ease off in an instant, of course he fucking would, but she doesn’t do either of those things. She just hugs him closer and sighs into his mouth, toes curling against his calves, flesh warming under his palms. She takes every fucking thing he gives her and gives it back twofold.

They may not make it to mass, after all, but he’ll just have to save that particular sin for his next confession, because the tighter she holds him, and the hotter she grows under his greedy hands, the less inclined he is to let her out of this bed—and he wasn’t all that inclined to do it in the first fucking place. No, he thinks he’ll take his holy communion right here, with his head between Beth’s strong legs and his tongue up her sweet cunt, drinking her come like sacramental wine, _forever and ever, amen._

He only stops kissing her when the burning in his lungs forces him to take a breath, and even then, he doesn’t go far, pressing his lips to her cheek, her jaw, the salty-sweet curve of her neck, making her hum as if she’s about to break into song again. He molds his palm to her tit and pushes his other hand between their straining bodies, cupping her cunt through her jeans and fumbling for her zip. He feels as if his head might actually fucking explode if he doesn’t get to fuck her _right this fucking instant_ —

“JESUS _FUCKING_ CHRIST.”

Murphy reacts like he’s been shot, every muscle in his body seizing painfully up as a surge of adrenaline kicks him right in the arse, and he rolls away from Beth to go scrambling to his feet, making for the dresser like the Devil himself is on his heels.

“What the _hell_ ,” Beth starts to say. Starts to, because the first angry voice has been joined by a second, higher pitched but just as loud, effectively drowning her out.

Murphy’s not listening to her, anyway, too focused on finding out what the _fuck_ is going on out there and eliminating whatever threat it may pose. He sweeps his clothes off the dresser and grabs his gun, checking the chamber and clicking off the safety before heading toward the door, barely conscious of Beth’s sharp inhale.

“Is that a _gun_?”

No, it’s a fucking tea kettle. Being a Georgia native, you’d think she’d be more familiar with what a fucking firearm looks like—of course, that’s probably just the shock talking. It’s not as if she knew he had it on him.

He’ll explain himself later. For now, he snaps, “Stay fucking put,” and goes charging into the hallway, slamming the bedroom door shut behind him and sparing a second to wish that it locked from the outside. The voices are clearer now and coming from the general direction of the tiny kitchenette, so that’s where Murphy goes, bare feet slapping against the hardwood floor, gun coming up as he rounds the corner—

And skids to a dead fucking stop, shoulder banging into the wall, eyes bulging in their sockets as he takes in the scene before him.

“What the fuck?” he says, because that’s all he really _can_ say. Didn’t even say it all that loudly, but it somehow manages to cut through Connor and Amy’s shouting match regardless, and they both swivel ’round to look at him, Amy’s knuckles going white against the fucking _frying pan_ she’s wielding like a deadly weapon. Her eyes drop briefly below his waist before bouncing back to his face, and her cheeks flush a violent red.

Shit. Right. He didn’t stop to put on any clothes before barging out of the bedroom, did he? In his defense, he thought someone was being fucking murdered out here. 

Far from thanking him for the timely intervention, though, Connor, who was backed into a corner formed by the aged refrigerator and a row of whitewashed cabinets when Murphy arrived on the scene, drops his arms—which he’d presumably flung up in order to shield his face from Amy’s cast-iron wrath—and storms forward to shout himself hoarse at his brother instead.

“Fucking _Christ_ , man. Couldn’t you’ve at least _warned_ me that your girlfriend’s flatmate was a fucking lunatic?”

Amy’s biceps flex when Connor calls her a _lunatic_ , wielding that frying pan like a baseball player up to bat, and Murphy sniggers at Connor’s flinch.

“Could have,” he allows, even though it’s not precisely true. Amy always seemed like such a nice, inoffensive girl; how the fuck was he to know that she’s the sort of person who’s inclined toward concussing people with cookware? He clicks on his gun’s safety and goes to stick it down his waistband before remembering that he hasn’t _got_ a waistband to stick it down. “If I’d fucking known you’d be dropping by. Christ, Connor, how the fuck’d you get in here?”

“He _broke_ in,” Amy pipes up, bristling in her pink nightshirt and still studiously looking at anything and everything that isn’t Murphy’s cock. Poor thing doesn’t even look like she’s had her morning coffee yet. “I mean, Jesus Christ, haven’t you ever heard of knocking? I thought you were a fucking burglar!”

Connor rounds on her and flings out his arms, and Murphy takes a giant step back so as not to get inadvertently struck across the nose. 

“That’s no cause for giving me fucking _brain damage_ , woman, Christ!”

“Uh, yeah, _it is_!”

Murphy squints and rocks forward, scratching the butt of his gun against the side of his head. No, yeah, that’s definitely a good-sized lump there on Connor’s temple. It’s even bleeding a bit.

“Got you good, did she?” he says, and dodges Connor’s flailing punch. Doesn’t jump back in time to avoid a hard smack to the shoulder, though, and he’s gearing up to give Connor a second bruise to match the first when Beth’s voice stops him in his fucking tracks, echoing the same sentiment from earlier, but louder.

“What the _HELL_.” 

Murphy spins around to find that Beth’s snuck up behind him unnoticed, hair still mussed, hands clenched at her sides as her eyes ping accusingly from him to Connor to Amy and back again. He opens his mouth to explain—Christ, _can_ he explain?—but Amy breezes past him and beats him to it, still clutching that fucking frying pan.

“Your boyfriend’s brother _broke_ into our _apartment_.”

Beth’s mouth pops open. “He _what_.”

Not one to be outdone, Connor shoulders past Murphy and adds, “And your crazy fucking flatmate tried to bash my fucking skull in with a fucking _frying pan_.”

Beth’s jaw looks poised to unhinge. “She WHAT.”

“Oh, please.” Amy crosses her arms, frying pan bumping her hip. “Like he wouldn’t’ve had it coming.”

Connor opens his mouth—probably to start shouting again—but Murphy smacks him lightly upside the head before he can pick another fight.

“Alright, alright, settle the fuck down,” he says, acknowledging Connor’s incredulous look with a shrug because, yeah. He never thought he’d be the voice of reason, either. He gives Amy a wide berth on his way to Beth and wraps a hand around her forearm, tugging her toward the hall that leads to the bedrooms. “I need to get dressed for mass. Don’t fucking kill each other while we’re gone, alright?”

“Are you certain you don’t just want to get Beth _un_ dressed?” Connor calls after them, and Murphy would flip him off if his hands weren’t full.

He pulls Beth into her bedroom and kicks the door shut, slumping back against it and scrubbing his palm down his face with a groan.

“Christ.” He drops his hand and looks at Beth, who’s frowning fiercely at him, fists propped on her hips. “What?”

“ _What_?” Beth parrots. “Your brother just broke into my apartment at eight in the freakin’ mornin’, that’s what. The apartment that _you_ brought a concealed weapon into.”

Fair points all. Murphy shrugs, smirking a bit. “Not concealed now, though, is it?”

“ _Don’t_ start,” Beth says, and the smirk slides right off Murphy’s face.

Fucking hell, but he could use a cigarette right about now.

He sighs and pushes away from the door, stopping at the dresser to put down his gun before heading over to the bedside cabinet. At some point during the night, he took off his rosary and set it down next to the digital clock, and he picks it up and loops it over his head now, crucifix bumping his sternum, polished wooden beads cool against his skin.

He can feel Beth watching him as he parades around nude, but he doesn’t reckon it’s an especially lustful look. He sighs again—Christ, he sounds like an old man—and then heads back to the dresser to retrieve his clothes.

“Boston’s a dangerous fucking city.” He steps into his underpants, then shakes out his jeans. Not too wrinkled—they’ll do. “And pepper spray just doesn’t fucking cut it.”

Beth crosses her arms. Purses her lips. “You even got a permit to carry concealed?”

Murphy smirks without humor. Instead of answering her question—because she won’t fucking _like_ the answer—he pulls his jeans up his legs and says, “You ought to consider carrying one of your own, actually. I don’t like the idea of you walking about at night unarmed.”

“I got a buck knife,” Beth informs him primly. “And _pepper spray_.”

Murphy snorts and does up his fly. He knows fucking well that he’s deflecting, here, but the fact of the matter is he’s not ready to have this fucking conversation, alright, and he’s sure as fuck not ready to get Beth even peripherally involved with the family business. He wants to shield her from that shit for as long as he possibly can. 

And, alright. He doesn’t want to risk losing her, either. Doesn’t want to see the look on her face when she finds out he’s a killer, never fucking mind that he’s only ever killed the wicked. To an innocent like Beth, murder’s murder; doesn’t fucking matter if the other person had it coming.

She’ll find out eventually. He fucking knows she will. 

But she doesn’t have to find out today.

He tugs his shirt over his head, fingercombs his hair, then walks over to Beth, who’s still frowning at him, arms tightly crossed. She doesn’t flinch when he reaches for her, though, and at least one of the myriad knots in his stomach loosens with relief.

So she’s not frightened of him. Not yet.

That’s something.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, wrapping his hands around her wrists and tugging her arms away from her chest. She lets him do it, and she doesn’t pull away when he steps in and wraps _his_ arms around her. He rests his chin on top of her head, smooths his hands up and down her back, and thinks, _Christ, she feels good._

For a moment, though, it’s like holding a statue, till she finally slumps into him, arms circling his waist, head coming down to rest against his shoulder.

“’Bout what?”

“About Connor. Wasn’t expecting him to break into your fucking flat, Jesus. S’pose I should have,” he amends darkly, fingers clenching in Beth’s jumper. He swears to fucking Christ, he’s gonna beat the holy hell out of his brother for this one.

“You tell him you were comin’ home with me?”

Murphy shakes his head. He was in a hurry last night, and he hadn’t been in the mood to shut his brother’s fat, gloating mouth. “S’pose he must’ve guessed.”

Beth rocks back to look him in the face, lips forming a crooked little smile. “You really think we’ve been that obvious?”

Something in him warms when she says _we_. And he knows he’s being a fucking pussy, but there’s no one here but Beth to see him like this, so who gives a fuck?

He says, “Think I’ve been, anyway,” and Beth grins wide enough to crack her face in two before pushing up on her toes to kiss him on the mouth.

It doesn’t last, though, if only because he’s afraid of what might happen if he leaves Connor and Amy unsupervised for much longer. And, Christ, if he’s gonna be a pussy about this anyway, then he might as well ask.

“You’re not angry with me, then?”

Beth hesitates, then shakes her head. “Nah. Just your brother.” The look on her face turns mildly severe. “I _do_ wish you’d told me about that gun, though.”

“Fair enough,” he allows. “And I’m not exactly pleased with how today’s turning out, myself. Could’ve done without your flatmate knowing what my cock looks like, for starters.”

Beth flushes, then nods. “Yeah. I could’a done without that, too.”

Is that right? Murphy smooths a hand over her arse and leans in to nip at her earlobe. “Want me all to yourself, d’you?”

She giggles and pushes out of his arms, holding her hands up defensively when he tries to grab hold of her again. “Uh-uh. I gotta put my makeup on, and I don’t want you messin’ it up.”

“What the fuck d’you need to put makeup on for?”

Wordlessly, Beth points to the mottled bruises that ring her throat, rolling her eyes when he grins. “I ain’t goin’ to church with _hickeys_ on my neck, jeez.”

“A right fucking shame, that is,” says Murphy, but Beth just rolls her eyes again and retrieves what must be a makeup bag from the top of her dresser.

It _is_ a shame, though, and not just because she intends to cover up his handiwork. He’ll hate to see her blot out her freckles, but if this is what it takes to make her feel more comfortable about attending church with him, then who the fuck is he to try and dissuade her?

He pulls on his boots and coat while Beth dabs on her makeup, then snags his wallet from the foot of the bed and wraps an arm around her to escort her to the kitchen.

Connor and Amy haven’t killed each other in Beth and Murphy’s absence, but they _are_ regarding one another rather suspiciously across the kitchen table, Connor holding an ice pack to his bruised temple. At least Amy’s put away her frying pan.

Connor breaks off glaring at Amy to smirk at Murphy and Beth. “Well, now. You’re back sooner than I’d expected.”

Beth huffs, and Murphy flips up his middle finger. “You coming with us or not, you smug fuck?”

“Oh, aye.” Connor pushes back his chair and gets to his feet, throwing the ice pack down on the table. “Came here to collect you, actually.”

“Lucky us,” Amy mutters.

Connor elects to ignore her, which is probably for the best. “Da’s waiting in the car.”

Beth, who was leading the way to the front door, trails to a halt. “Your dad’s here?”

Murphy doesn’t like the look of Connor’s smile. “Yeah, he is. And I’m sure he’ll be eager to meet _you_ , sweetheart.”

Connor flinches and swears when Murphy slaps him upside the head, but Beth says, “Alright, alright, knock it off,” before he can retaliate, and saints preserve them, Connor actually _listens_.

Looks like Murphy’s not the only one who’s wrapped around her littlest finger.

Murphy expects her to continue forward, but she hesitates, fiddling with her stack of bracelets and gnawing on her lower lip. He gives her a gentle shake and asks, “What’s troubling you, sweetheart?”

“Yeah,” Connor chimes in, giving her an equally gentle nudge. “C’mon, then, tell us.”

For a moment, Murphy’s convinced that she’ll be just as reticent with them now as she was last night when they asked what was troubling her _then_ , and he’s gearing up to prod at her again when she says, “It’s just…listen, I know it’s stupid, but what if he doesn’t—”

“He’ll love you,” Murphy cuts in before Beth can finish, and she gives him wide, startled doe eyes as Connor smirks knowingly at him over the top of her head. Murphy ignores his brother and looks Beth full in the face, as if he could somehow force her to believe what he’s saying by staring at her hard enough. “Don’t you worry yourself over _that_ shit, alright? He will.”

Beth’s answering smile is decidedly nervous. “Even though I’m a Baptist?”

Murphy laughs and squeezes her into his side. “Yeah. Even though you’re a Baptist.”

“Should warn you, though,” says Connor, “he’ll probably want to know whether or not you and Murph here intend to give him grandchildren any time soon.”

Beth instantly flushes beet red and descends into a coughing fit, and Murphy gives Connor another smack for his troubles. Still, he can’t deny the twinge he felt deep in his gut at the insinuation.

Grandchildren, was it? He doesn’t know if either he or Beth are ready for that, but he can’t say that he wouldn’t eventually be keen to _try_.

In the meantime.

“Let’s get going, then,” he says, curling his arm farther around Beth’s shoulders and heading out the door, nearly knocking over the young woman who’s stood on the other side of it. 

Her head’s lowered, hand shoved wrist deep in her bag as she presumably searches for her keys, and Murphy tamps back the urge to tell her to watch where the fuck she’s going.

“Sorry,” he mumbles instead, and the woman glances up, beanie slipping down over her eyes for a second before she pushes it out of the way. 

She blinks when she gets a good look at him, lips parting. Does he know her from somewhere? He doesn’t think so, but—

“Oh, hey, Jess,” Beth says, fingers curling in Murphy’s coat. “This’s Connor and Murphy. They’re, uh, friends from McGinty’s. We were just headin’ out, so—bye.”

The woman—Jess—doesn’t say anything, just stares after them as they head down the corridor toward the lifts. Murphy can feel her eyes on the back of his skull the whole time, and it makes his scalp tingle unpleasantly.

Strange fucking woman.

Beth hits the lift’s down button, and he asks, “That your other flatmate? The one who’s never home?”

“Yeah, that’s her. Why?”

Murphy scratches his itching scalp. The lift’s doors slide open, and he steps in after Beth, Connor close on his heels. “Didn’t like the way she was looking at us.”

Beth frowns at him. “What d’you mean?”

“Reckon she thought you were fucking us both,” Connor says, earning himself a fourth slap upside the head.

“Unbelievable,” Beth mutters. The lift’s doors rumble open, and she steps out into the lobby, spinning ’round on her heel to glare at Connor and Murphy when they start to tussle.

“Sometime today, fellas,” she says, stern as any Mother Superior, and Connor and Murphy break apart, thwarted.

The car’s parked at the curb in front of Beth’s building, and their da’s waiting in the driver’s seat, just as Connor said he’d be. He’s smoking one of his Cuban cigars with the windows rolled down, but he puts it out when he spots them.

Beth trails her fingers down Murphy’s arm and takes his hand, and he squeezes hers reassuringly. Noah MacManus is the most dangerous man she’ll ever meet, but she has nothing to fear from him.

And Noah proves that when he climbs out of the car and ambles up the pavement to meet them, smiling gently when he looks at Beth.

Neither Connor nor Murphy have ever introduced their father to the woman they sleep with before. The man’s no fool, and he can’t be blind to the significance of this.

“Well, now,” says Noah, “aren’t you going to introduce me to your lovely friend here, boys?”

Beth turns pink, and Murphy huffs under his breath because, yeah. His da’s a charming old bastard when he wants to be, which is usually.

She introduces herself, though, before Connor or Murphy can. “I’m Beth, sir,” she says, holding out her free hand for Noah to shake. “Beth Greene. It’s awful nice to meet you.”

Noah’s smile grows, showing teeth, and he takes Beth’s hand in both of his. “Beth, is it? I’m pleased to finally meet you, my dear. Murphy’s spoken of you often.”

“Is that right?” Beth asks, giving Murphy a sidelong look, eyes crinkling at the corners.

Murphy ducks his head, cheeks prickling. “ _Da_. For Christ’s sake.”

“Watch your tongue, boy,” Noah says mildly. “There’s a lady present.” He gives Beth’s hand a squeeze before releasing her and asking, “Would you care to join us for mass, dear?”

“That was the plan, Mr. MacManus.”

“Noah,” their da insists, and Beth blushes again.

“Alright, Noah. If you don’t mind me joinin’ y’all?”

“Of course not, my dear.” Noah holds the passenger-side door open for Beth, pushing down the front seat so she can crawl into the back. Beth murmurs a thank-you and climbs in, and Murphy taps his da on the shoulder.

“Can we stop at an IHOP, Da? Beth hasn’t eaten yet.” At least, he’s fairly certain she hasn’t—the kitchen didn’t smell like food, anyway—and even if she has, she’s skinny enough that she could stand to eat again.

“Neither have I,” Connor pipes up, jostling at Murphy. “Not that you give a fuck.”

Murphy elbows Connor in the ribs, then turns a plaintive look on their da. Noah sighs, probably at their antics rather than Murphy’s request. After all, he’s not the sort of man to let a lady go hungry.

“Alright, alright,” says Noah. “Settle down and get in the car, then. You don’t want to keep your lady waiting, d’you, boy?”

“No, sir,” Murphy says, and climbs into the backseat with Beth.

He hears his da asking, “And what happened to you, then?” but he doesn’t catch Connor’s response, and he doesn’t particularly care to. No, he’s perfectly content to slide his arm around Beth’s shoulders and tuck her into his side, to feel her nuzzle into him and rest a light hand on his knee.

Noah and Connor duck into the front seat and clap their doors shut. Beth presses her mouth to Murphy’s ear and says, “I like your dad.”

Murphy leans his cheek against the top of her head. “Glad to hear it—so long as you still like me best.”

He feels it when she smiles. “You don’t gotta worry yourself over _that_ , Mr. MacManus.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains a brief allusion to abuse, behavior that could be interpreted as a form of self-harm, and an ethnic slur. Please take these warnings into account before moving forward ❤️
> 
> In much happier news, Maj is writing a [prequel](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22919062/chapters/54783523) (!!!) to this fic, and I insist that you all go read it right now immediately. This chapter will still be waiting for you when you get back, and I can promise you that you won't want to wait to read Maj's take on this verse. Her grasp on the world of BDS is next level, and I can only hope to one day emulate it. Kindly go shower my wife in the adoration she deserves, pls and thanks.

Murphy bounces up and down on the balls of his feet and glares at the slowly mounting numbers on the lift’s digital readout as if he can somehow will the fucking thing into going faster if he only tries hard enough. Beth’s building hasn’t even got that many floors, but at the rate he’s going, you’d think he was ascending from the ninth fucking circle of hell.

He certainly fucking _feels_ as if he’s been damned to his own personal hell, anyway, because if he thought he was nervous about finally getting to fuck Beth, that’s nothing compared to the state he’s in now, fit to climb out of his own fucking skin and up the lift’s bare grey walls. He gives the no _smoking sign_ a hateful look and flicks his lighter open and shut. Just how sensitive are this building’s smoke detectors, anyway? 

He clicks his lighter shut a final time and tucks it into his coat’s pocket. Nah. Best not to risk it. Not when he’s got something that needs saying to Beth.

The lift finally grinds to a halt—he swears to fucking Christ that it didn’t take this long when it was going _down_ —and after a protracted pause that makes him think he’ll have to pry the fucking things apart himself, the doors judder open on their tracks. He all but tears into the corridor the second they do, too, thick rubber soles squeaking on the waxed floor, thumb chafing at his ring finger.

He tucks his other hand into his pocket to make certain that nothing’s fallen out of it without him noticing—it hasn’t, thank Christ—and wonders if Beth’ll understand the significance of the gesture he intends to make. Chances are good that she will. Loads of Americans’re familiar with the practice these days, and besides, Beth’s people are from Ireland, aren’t they?

Yeah. She’ll understand.

She’s fucking got to, because he just doesn’t fucking know if he’ll be able to put what he’s feeling into words. Thinks it might be too big for words, actually. Too much, like every language he’s fluent in combined couldn’t do it one fucking bit of justice.

He’ll try, though, if she doesn’t understand the meaning of the gift he wants to give her, after all. For her, he’ll string the words together and fucking _try_.

It’s a bit funny, though. If the ride up in the lift from hell lasted a small fucking eternity, then the walk to Beth’s front door seems to go by in a blink, and before Murphy even fucking knows it, he’s standing in front of it and staring down the peephole like it’s the black hat in a western, trying to work up the nerve to stop being such a fucking pansy and just fucking knock already.

He probably should’ve texted ahead to let her know he was coming, but…fuck. It’s just that he wanted to surprise her, he supposes. They made plans to meet up tomorrow morning for breakfast when he dropped her off after mass, too, so he doubts she’s expecting to see him again already. He hopes to God that his turning up on her doorstep unannounced’ll be a _welcome_ surprise, at least.

Christ, but he doesn’t even know for certain that she’s _home_. Could be that she’s gone shopping with Amy, or whatever it is that university students do for fun on their days off. 

But he won’t fucking know for certain till he’s knocked, will he? Time to pull himself the fuck together and stop acting like a schoolboy with his first hard-on. He takes a deep breath, crosses himself, and goes to rap his knuckles against the door below the peephole, only to drop his hand when it swings open before he can knock.

Murphy blinks, his surprise turning to pleasure when he sees that it’s Beth who’s come to the door. She’s got her coat on, handbag’s strap crisscrossing her torso, and she looks just as startled to see him as he is to see her. More so, even.

He recovers first, sticking both hands in his pockets, mouth pulling up at the corners. “Hey,” he says. “Sorry, I probably should’ve rang ahead, but—mind if I come in for a bit?”

Beth doesn’t say anything, and Murphy’s smile reverses course into a frown. Right. Christ. She was obviously heading out, wasn’t she? He really _should’ve_ fucking texted her. “This a bad time?”

Beth clutches her handbag’s strap and chews on the corner of her lower lip. Murphy wants to run his finger along that lip to free it from the clutch of her teeth and soothe the dents left behind with his tongue, but something about her body language suggests that the touch wouldn’t be welcome at the moment, so he keeps his hands to himself.

“It—no.” She won’t quite meet his eyes, and that combined with her closed-off posture works to give Murphy a sinking sense of dread. “I was gonna go study at the library, but that, uh. That can wait.”

Murphy’s hands clench inside his pockets. “Can I come in, then?”

She finally meets his eyes, only then he sort of wishes she hadn’t, because he doesn’t like the look on her face at all, reminiscent of a deer caught in the blinding headlights of an oncoming car. Christ, but what the fuck could he’ve possibly done to have her looking at him like that?

But then she blinks, and the startled look disappears, except Murphy’s not certain if he likes the cautious neutrality that replaces it any better.

“Sure,” she says, stepping aside so her slight body no longer blocks the doorway. “You, uh, you want somethin’ to eat? I still gotta go grocery shopping, so we don’t got much, but—”

“No, thanks, love.” He steps inside, careful not to box her up against the wall, and tugs the door shut behind him. He looks at her sidelong, notes that she’s yet to shrug off her handbag or remove her coat, and tries his damnedest to summon a careless smile. “Wouldn’t turn down a beer, though.”

Beth just nods and heads toward the kitchen, and Murphy frowns after her for a moment before following.

What’s got her acting like this, so—so closed the fuck off? He can’t imagine what he could’ve done to upset her, but this is his first time in a—fuck, a _relationship_ , he supposes. It’s not as if he has any fucking inkling as to how they’re supposed to work.

Are they in a relationship, even? He assumed as much—assumed that a girl like Beth would want that sort of thing, and he’s gone as far as to introduce her to his fucking father, for Christ’s sake, so, surely, she understands that’s what he wants from her. They haven’t discussed it in as many words, no, but he didn’t think they needed to.

Maybe it’s not something he’s done. Could be that it’s something else entirely. Should he ask? He wants to ask, but—

But the crack of a popped tab pulls him out of his internal spiral, and he looks up to find Beth stood across the kitchen table from him, holding out a beer for him to take.

She’s only holding the one, though. Come to think of it, Murphy has no idea whether Beth drinks or not. He’s never seen her at McGinty’s on her days off, but it could just be that she doesn’t want to socialize where she works. It’s not as if there’s a dearth of pubs in South Boston for her to choose from.

“You wanna sit?” she asks him, and Murphy nods, wraps his hand around the bottle’s cool glass neck. His fingers brush Beth’s, and she flinches and retracts her hand as soon as she sees that he’s got a steady grip on the bottle.

Murphy sits down heavily and takes a large gulp of somewhat flat beer to disguise the hurt that’s almost fucking certainly showing on his face. Fuck. What the fuck’s she flinching from him for?

It’s looking more and more likely that her bad mood has something to do with him, after all.

There’s a pile of newspapers languishing atop the table, and Murphy sweeps them aside without really looking at them. Sets down his beer. Jerks his chin at the chair opposite his, the chair Connor was sat in this morning before Murphy’s day took an apparent turn for the fucking worse.

“Sit?” It’s a request, not a demand like it was on Saturday night. He’s not about to push his fucking luck.

Beth does as he asks, anyway, but only after a moment’s hesitation, and only uncrossing her arms long enough to shrug off her handbag and take a seat. 

She doesn’t remove her coat, though.

She hugs her arms to her stomach and asks, “Did you—did you wanna talk to me about somethin’?”

Murphy takes another swig of beer, wipes his mouth, sets the bottle down. He’s not in the mood to drink, after all.

“Yeah,” he says. “Wanted to give you something, actually.”

He tucks his hand into his pocket, but when Beth flinches a-fucking- _gain_ , his hurt sparks off his temper and turns his tone harsh, hostile. 

“What the fuck’s the matter with you?”

God, he fucking hates the way he sounds, hates that Beth fucking shrinks in on herself for a third fucking time like he’s—Christ, like he’s as good as the scum God put him on this earth to kill, like he’s the sort of motherfucker who’d raise his hand and his voice to the very woman he’s supposed to protect.

He opens his mouth to apologize, but Beth doesn’t give him a chance to. Doesn’t stay shrunk in on herself for long, either. No, she straightens her shoulders and gives him the scalding glare that he damn well fucking deserves and snaps, “You really wanna know what my _fucking_ problem is?”

The obscenity hits him like an open-handed slap to the face. It’s not like Beth to use that sort of language, not unless she’s cursing at him to fuck her harder, deeper, _moremoremore_.

With some effort, he shakes off his surprise—and the memory—and straightens his shoulders, too. Fires right back with, “Wouldn’t’ve asked if I didn’t want to fucking know, would I?” 

Beth’s lips form a thin, bloodless gash, and she pushes abruptly away from the table, her chair’s legs squealing across the tiled floor and setting Murphy’s fucking teeth on edge. She rifles through the stack of newspapers for a moment—which, what the fuck?—muttering agitatedly under her breath all the while before apparently finding what she was looking for and tossing it across the table to Murphy.

It lands in front of him with a muted slap, and he blinks down at it, baffled, before grabbing a corner and dragging it closer.

It’s dated over ten years ago, but Murphy doesn’t linger over that. No, his eyes are drawn almost immediately to the headline, and what he sees there makes everything inside of him go deathly still in the way that usually precedes a shootout.

He recognizes that headline. Of course he fucking does. He’s got a copy of this same newspaper in his and Connor’s flat, creased from being folded and unfolded over and over again, yellowed with age like this one and stored in a shoebox alongside roughly a dozen others. Different publishers, different fonts, but they all share one thing in common.

The words _vigilante killings_ leap off the page and sear themselves into his eyeballs like an afterimage, and they’re still floating across his vision when he looks up at Beth.

She’s hugging her arms tight to her stomach like she’s trying to stop her guts from spilling out onto the floor. Her face is stark white, eyes hot and furious, but her lower lip’s wobbling in a way that suggests she’s near tears.

He wants to get the fuck up, to rush around the table and clutch her to him before those tears can spill, but he doesn’t. Knows he shouldn’t. He was right earlier, when he thought that she didn’t look receptive to touch.

And now he knows fucking why.

He drops the paper. It takes quite a bit of willpower not to rend the fucking thing in half. “Who told you?”

He doesn’t even swear when he says it. A remarkable display of restraint, that. Da would be proud.

He didn’t think Beth’s lips could get any more pinched, but she proves him wrong. “You gonna hurt ’em if I say who?”

“Not unless they’re a mafioso, I won’t,” he says, blunt. Cards are already on the fucking table, aren’t they? Might as fucking well. “You’ve read the papers, haven’t you? If you have, then you know we don’t hurt innocents.”

“Yeah? And what’s your definition of _innocent_?”

“It was your flatmate, wasn’t it?” It’s only a guess, and Beth neither confirms nor denies it, but the carefully blank look that overtakes her face suggests he’s right. “Jess, right? Thought she was looking at me funny.”

Beth’s chin dips, head sagging forward on her neck. She’s got a defeated air about her, and Murphy fucking hates it. “She’s not gonna call the cops on you or anythin’. She was born and raised in Boston. She thinks—she thinks you guys are _cool_.”

Beth’s flat tone paired with her grimacing mouth implies that _she_ thinks no such fucking thing.

He says, “It’s not the cops I’m worried about,” because it’s true. He pushes out of his chair and tries to get Beth to meet his eyes, to read the sincerity in them. “I was going to tell you.”

Beth finally looks at him, but only so she can flay him alive with the heat of her scowl alone. “Easy enough to say when you’ve already been caught, ain’t it?”

“I fucking _mean_ it, Beth.” So much for not swearing at her. “It’s not exactly an easy fucking subject to broach, though, is it? ‘Sorry, sweetheart, forgot to mention that my brother and I kill violent criminals for a living. Pass the fucking chips?’”

Beth looks like she wants to spit—at his feet, probably. “Oh, screw you. You don’t get to talk down to me. I’m not the one who’s runnin’ ’round _murdering_ people!”

Fuck, she’s talking to him—worse, _looking_ at him—as if he’s as good as the scum he puts down. “It’s not fucking _murder_. It’s justice.”

Beth’s eyes bulge in their sockets, and she flings out her hands. “That’s what the criminal _justice_ system is _for_!”

Christ, he does _not_ have the patience for _this_ particular conversation. “Yeah. Because putting men behind bars on nonviolent drug charges while mob bosses walk free, _that’s_ my idea of justice.”

Beth shakes her head, ponytail swinging like a pendulum. “This ain’t about the flaws in America’s court system. This’s about right and wrong, and what you’re doin’ here is _wrong_.”

He actually laughs, then, a harsh, humorless bark that tears out of his throat like a cough and startles Beth into giving him deer eyes again. “No, it’s fucking not. It’s the rightest thing I’ve ever done. It’s what God put me on this earth to do.”

Beth looks at him like he just professed a belief in alien abductions. “You think you’re on a mission from _God_? What, like the Blues Brothers?”

Well, when she puts it like that. Murphy smiles without humor. “Yeah. S’pose that’s not far off.”

Beth shakes her head again. Her makeup must be wearing off, because Murphy can see the dark bruises his mouth left behind on her pale skin. “You don’t get to decide who lives and who dies. You just don’t. I don’t care if you think you’re on some kinda mission. The crusaders did, too, and look how that turned out.” 

“Yeah? We don’t get to decide who lives and who dies, but your precious fucking criminal justice system does?”

“I don’t believe in the death penalty.”

Christ, he can’t fucking cope with this. “Beth—”

She gives him her fiercest glare yet, eyes wet with standing tears. “ _Don’t._ ”

His fists spasm and clench. “Just fucking—”

“I said _don’t_.”

Murphy snaps his mouth shut, the click of his teeth overly loud in the thunderous silence of the kitchen.

Alright. Okay.

Fuck this. Just—fuck it.

Never let it be said that he can’t see when he’s not fucking welcome.

“Alright.” He nods, once. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

She doesn’t protest. Doesn’t ask him to say and talk this through with her. Just stands there, betrayed and defensive, while Murphy’s stomach sinks into his fucking boots.

He retreats a step, and the weight in his pocket jostles against his thigh. He hesitates, debates with himself, then shakes his head and tosses it onto the table.

“Here.”

Beth looks at it like it’s a live fucking bomb. “What’s that?”

What the fuck does she think it is? “S’why I came over. Wanted to give it to you.”

Beth’s lower lip trembles for a moment, but then she firms it. “I don’t want it.”

Christ. Girl certainly knows how to kick a man when he’s down, doesn’t she? Murphy never thought that Beth had it in her to be cruel.

But then, he reckons he deserves it. 

“Yeah, well. Neither the fuck do I.”

He leaves it on the table, leaves Beth behind. He doesn’t slam the door on his way out, but it’s a near fucking thing.

* * *

Murphy slumps over the bartop and holds his hand out in front of his face, spinning his claddagh ring ’round and ’round his finger. The band is thick and heavy and made out of a single piece of zirconium, and it’d cost him a pretty fucking penny—nearly five hundred fucking dollars, and that’s not even accounting for sales tax—but it’d been well fucking worth it, or so he’d thought at the time.

He’s still wearing it with the heart pointing towards him. And, yeah, he’s probably a right fucking pussy for thinking so, but he can’t ever see himself taking it off, no matter that the twin to this ring is probably languishing in a dumpster somewhere.

 _Fuck._ He drops his hand and thunks his forehead against the bartop in the vague hope that it’ll give him a concussion and a convenient case of amnesia. It doesn’t, which is a right fucking shame, because he’s built up enough of an alcohol tolerance over the years that it’d probably take an entire liquor store’s worth of whiskey to get him blackout drunk the way he wants to be.

Which doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s not keen on trying, mind you.

McGinty’s is closed on Sundays, but today wouldn’t be the first that Doc’s let them in during off hours, and Murphy doubts it’ll be the last, supposing he survives the alcohol poisoning he intends to give himself. The old man’s in the back room taking inventory or whatever the fuck, and Connor and Murphy’ve been helping themselves to what’s behind the bar. It’s fine; Doc knows they’re good for it.

Murphy fumbles for the uncapped bottle of Jameson that’s sat at his elbow—he’s long since given up on using shot glasses and has taken to drinking straight from the source—but it disappears before he can get a decent grip on it, and he blinks muzzily at the empty space where it used to be before turning an accusing, bloodshot glare on his brother.

“The fuck’re you doin’?”

“Cutting you the fuck off, that’s what the fuck I’m doing,” Connor replies easily, holding the bottle above his head when Murphy makes a grab for it. Nearly goes tumbling off his fucking stool, too, and probably _would have_ if not for Connor catching him by the shoulder and steadying him out.

Murphy shrugs Connor off and plants an elbow on the bartop, eyeing the bottle of Jameson like it’s the Holy fucking Grail. “Fuck you,” he says. “You aren’t my fucking bartender. You haven’t—you haven’t got the _authority_ for that shit.”

“Sure I do.”

Murphy squints at Connor, dubious. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Doc told me to keep an eye on you. Doesn’t want you drinking up all of his stock.”

Oh, fucking brilliant. Now he’s got Doc _and_ his brother conspiring against him. “Fuck you both,” he mutters, before slumping over the bar again and pillowing his head on his arms. Maybe he ought to take a nap, as Doc and Connor have decided that he’s not allowed to have any sort of fun. Hell, a bartop wouldn’t even be the most uncomfortable place he’s gone to sleep on.

Except, no. He _doesn’t_ want to go to sleep, because if he sleeps, he’ll dream, and if he dreams, he’ll dream of Beth. ’Course, his dreams’re probably the only place he’ll see her anymore, so maybe he _should_ go to sleep.

“Hey.” Connor taps him on the shoulder, and Murphy twitches irritably, pushing up from his slump to glower at him. Unaffected, Connor goes on, “I think you ought to go and talk to her.”

Murphy scoffs and fumbles for the pack of Carroll’s that’s lying on the bartop. Lights up and takes a long drag of tobacco smoke before finally saying, “Girl doesn’t _want_ to fucking talk to me. Made that perfectly fuckin’ clear, didn’t she?”

“Christ, quit being so melo-fucking-dramatic, would you?” It says quite a fucking lot about Murphy’s present state that he doesn’t even bother to slap Connor upside the head for _that_ one. “So you fought. It’s what couples do, innit?”

Murphy suppresses a pang. It’s fairly dull, at least, probably on account of the whiskey he’s been mainlining.

“Not a fucking couple.” Not anymore, anyway. Never really had the chance to fucking be one before fucking _Jess_ came along and cocked it all up.

And, alright. Fucking fine. The blame lies with him, too. He fucking knows it does.

Not that acknowledging as much fucking helps any.

“Could be.” Connor gives him another tap, harder than the last. “If you’d just pull your fucking head out of your arse and apologize to her, Christ.”

Murphy flicks ash off the end of his cigarette. Brings it back to his mouth and bites down on the filter. “Why bother? Wouldn’t fucking help any.”

He hears the thunk of glass on wood. Connor must’ve put the Jameson down, but Murphy’s not in the mood to make a grab for it any longer. Why bother, indeed.

“Oh,” says Connor, “is that right?”

Murphy stubs his cigarette out in the ashtray—fucking thing’s not even halfway shot, but it turns out he’s not in the mood to smoke, either—and treats his brother to a glare that’d send most sensible people running for the fucking hills.

But Connor’s not most people, is he? Sure as fuck isn’t _sensible_. And that’s why he won’t let this fucking drop.

“Yeah,” Murphy says. Fucking lies through his teeth, and he supposes that’s another one for the confession booth. “That’s fucking right. Christ, man, who the fuck d’you think you are, anyway? Dr. fucking Phil?”

Connor smirks. “Christ, no. That bald old fuck _wishes_ he were good looking as me.” When Murphy doesn’t so much as snort, the smirk slides off Connor’s face, and he levels a finger at Murphy’s. “Now you listen the fuck here, Murph. I don’t want to watch you fuck up a good thing, alright? And Beth’s a good fucking thing—better than you deserve, God fucking knows.”

Unable to stomach the knowing look on Connor’s face, Murphy swivels ’round on his stool to face the bar instead. A mistake, as it turns out, because the pub’s dull, dingy lights bounce off the mirrored shelves and spear him right in the eyes, prompting him to groan piteously and bury his face in his arms once again.

“Already fucking told you,” he mumbles, addressing the sticky bartop. “Girl doesn’t want anything to do with me. Thinks it’s fucking _immoral_ , what we’re doing.”

Connor hums, thoughtful like. “Aye, well, it _is_ a hard pill to swallow, isn’t it? Think she just needs a bit of time to wrap her pretty little head around it.”

Connor’s not in a position to appreciate the gesture, but Murphy still rolls his eyes. “Why the fuck d’you care, anyway? Talking about me _fucking up a good thing_ like it’s any of your fucking business, Christ.”

Connor claps him hard on the shoulder, and Murphy raises a hand to swat ineffectually at him. “Your business is my business, brother. You’re fucking insufferable when you sulk, and neither I nor Da have the constitution to cope with it, so quit your fucking moping and sort yourself the fuck out, alright?”

 _Moping?_ Murphy braces his hands against the edge of the bartop and shoves himself upright—gets the fucking spins while he’s at it, but he manages—and rounds on Connor with half a mind to swing a fist square at his stupid fucking face, no fucking matter that Connor could probably wipe the floor with him right now.

But the bang of a door clapping shut does a good job of distracting him before he can try, and he squints toward the front of the pub, shoulders tensing right up when he spots a group of men he doesn’t recognize filing inside.

He exchanges a look with Connor, who shakes his head subtly when Murphy goes for the gun tucked down his waistband. Alright. Playing it cool, then. For the time being, at least.

Probably for the best. Chances are decent he’d end up shooting himself in the fucking foot if he tried firing his gun now. He _feels_ more sober than he did a moment ago, but that doesn’t necessarily mean his fine motor skills have followed suit.

Connor slumps back on his stool and plants his elbows on the bartop, and Murphy copies him, uncertain if he should try and look sober, or if he should play up his buzz in order to lull their party crashers into a false sense of security.

Christ, how fucking many of them are there, anyway? Six? Might be six. Could actually be three, supposing he’s piss drunk enough to be seeing double.

“Evening, fellas,” Connor says, loud and slurred so as to give the impression that he’s much drunker than he actually is. “Missed the sign out front, did you? Pub’s closed.”

“Happens to the best of us,” Murphy says, and he _doesn’t_ have to exaggerate the slur in his voice. Fuck.

He tries not to let his irritation with himself show on his face, pastes on a jovial grin and slaps Connor on the chest. “Aw, why not let ’em stay, then? The more the merrier, right?”

The strangers have lined themselves up in front of the bar, and the fella at the head of the group—short, dark haired, doesn’t appear to have a twin so there probably really are six of the bastards, after all—scowls and spits a great green glob of bubbling phlegm onto the floor.

Doc’s not gonna like that. He just fucking cleaned in here.

“Coupla fuckin’ comedians, ain’t you?” says the short fella. Murphy decides to call him Napoleon, for obvious reasons. “Fuckin’ pissin’ myself over here.”

Murphy’s still drunk enough to take that last bit literally, and is moderately disappointed when he finds that Napoleon’s jeans aren’t dark with piss, after all.

“Should quit their day jobs and go into a career in standup,” says a second, taller fella to the tune of muffled snickers. Murphy, for his part, is unamused—Christ, do they always have to drag it out?—but he plays along, shaping his lips into a smirk and elbowing Connor in the ribs.

“Hear that, Connor? What d’you think? Reckon a career change’s in the cards?”

Connor appears to consider it, tilting his head from side to side before shaking it, once.

“Nah,” he pronounces, and that one word’s accompanied by two clicks as he and Murphy slide their guns’ safetys off. “Don’t think I’ve the temperament for it. I’ve got awful fucking stage fright, see.”

Murphy’s smirk turns genuine, but it doesn’t last. No, it fades right fucking quick when he hears the sound of a half dozen more safetys clicking off.

Yeah. There’s definitely six of them.

Christ, but he hopes to fucking God that Doc stays in the back. The old man can hold his own well enough against rowdy patrons, but Murphy sure as fuck doesn’t want him getting caught in the crosshairs of _this_ shit.

“Outnumbered and drunk off your asses,” Napoleon says, pointing his gun’s business end square between Murphy’s eyes. “Now that _is_ somethin’ to laugh about.”

“Never thought I’d live to see the day,” says the second guy, whom Murphy dubs Brownnoser. “The untouchable MacManus brothers, on their way to the fuckin’ gallows.”

Christ, these guys need to lay off the Scorsese films. “Sorry,” Murphy says, making two of their would-be assailants flinch when he uses the butt of his gun to scratch an itch on his temple. “Do we know you fellas?”

Napoleon’s mouth pops open—looks like a fucking landed fish, and that _is_ hilarious—but Connor answers Murphy’s question before anyone else can.

“Don’t reckon we do.” He cocks his head, squints. “Who the fuck’re you, again?”

“You _motherfucker_ —” Napoleon flushes heart attack red and jerks forward like a rabid dog on the end of a chain, and probably would’ve swung a fist at Connor’s face if his brown-nosing mate hadn’t held him back. Both of them appear to’ve forgotten that they’re armed, _Christ_. “You killed our boss, you dumb mick. You tellin’ me you don’t fuckin’ remember that shit?”

“Killed loads of mafiosos,” Murphy says with an easy shrug. _Wind ’em up and watch ’em go._ “All start to blur together after a while, don’t they?”

“Oh, fuck this,” somebody mutters, and the sound of a hammer pulling back rings in Murphy’s ears like a struck bell, and he says a silent prayer and starts to squeeze his gun’s trigger—

Except then the front door swings open for the second fucking time—Christ, do closed signs mean nothing anymore?—and neither Murphy nor Connor hesitate to leap upon the presented opportunity when three of the probably-six mobsters swing around to see who the fuck’s waltzed in _this_ _time_. Murphy doesn’t check to see who it is, just fills Brownnoser with lead and _tsks_ under his breath when he sees that Connor’s managed to take out _two_ of the bastards in the time it took him to shoot _one_. Serves him right for drowning his sorrows like a lovelorn pussy, he supposes.

The remaining three have dived out of the line of fire, overturning tables to use as makeshift shields, and Murphy takes advantage of the brief ceasefire to feed a new clip into his gun’s chamber, glancing across the bullet-riddled bodies of the men he and Connor just killed and toward the front door—

 _Fuck_ , he thinks, blood running cold, fingers going numb on the butt of his gun.

_Fuck, no._

“Lord’s fucking name,” Connor mumbles, and, yeah. Yeah, that about sums it up.

Jesus, Mary, and _fucking_ Joseph, but what the fucking _hell_ are Beth and Amy doing here?

He can’t afford to waste another second wondering, though, not when two of the remaining guys just popped up from behind their overturned tables to fire several rounds at Connor and Murphy. They miss—shatter a fair few bottles of liquor while they’re at it, though, and Doc’s not gonna like _that_ , either—and Murphy stumbles to his feet and takes out the one while Connor kills the other. And, fuck, _fuck_ , where the fuck has the sixth guy gone?

“Mother _fucker_ ,” Connor swears, rough and furious and fucking _panicked_ , because Murphy’s got his answer, only now he fucking wishes he _didn’t_.

Beth and Amy cowered back against the wall at the hail of gunfire, and they freeze like cornered rabbits and grasp each other’s hands when the sixth guy—that short fuck Napoleon—pops out from behind an overturned table like a homicidal jack-in-the-box and aims his gun at Beth’s head.

Everything inside of Murphy goes very cold and very still. He’s probably still drunk, but he doesn’t _feel_ as if he is.

Doesn’t feel much of anything at all.

“Yeah.” Napoleon eases over to Beth and Amy and tangles his fingers in Beth’s shirt, and Murphy sees it when she grits her teeth. “You know these bitches? Thought so.” He grins, confident and smarmy, flashing a gold tooth. “Hell, even if you didn’t, you still wouldn’t make a damn move, would you? You dumb fucks’re all about protecting the innocent, ain’t you?

“C’mon,” he mutters, jabbing his gun’s muzzle into Beth’s side and dragging her away from Amy, toward the door. “Ease along there, honey, that’s it. Doin’ real good, sweetheart.”

Murphy’s fingers twitch against his gun’s cool muzzle. His ears are ringing. “You so much as fucking think about it, and I’ll put a fucking bullet in your skull before you can pull the trigger.”

Napoleon laughs, nasal and grating. “You really wanna risk it? Nah. Don’t think you would.” But then his laughter fades, and he grits his teeth, grinding his gun’s muzzle deeper into Beth’s side, making her wince. “Jesus fuckin’ Christ, who gave you bastards the authority to decide who lives and who dies, anyway? You think you’re on some kinda mission from God when you’re really just a coupla— _fuck_!”

Napoleon squeals like a stuck pig and hunches in on himself, gun slipping away from Beth’s ribs to point at the floor, and Murphy aims and squeezes and takes him the rest of the way down in a red fucking spray.

He lowers his gun and sees Connor doing the same in his periphery. He knows his brother would tell him to fuck right off he tried to thank him, so he doesn’t, just rushes across the pub to Beth. He gives Amy a cursory glance—she’s alive, even if her complexion would suggest otherwise—before taking Beth’s face in his hands and sliding his fingers over her cheekbones, feeling her icy cold skin and chattering teeth and wondering if she’s gone into shock.

“I’m alright,” she’s saying. “I’m alright, Murphy, I’m—”

He muffles the rest of what she was going to say when he tugs her close and presses her face to his shoulder, running shaking hands up and down her back and thanking God over and over under his breath. Connor’s come over to check on Amy more thoroughly, which is good, because Murphy doesn’t think he could pry himself away from Beth if his life depended on it.

Feels as if his life depends on keeping her as close as possible from here on out, actually.

“Jesus fucking Christ, girl.” He tangles his fingers in her ponytail, presses a hard kiss to the top of her head. “What the fuck were you even _doing_ here?”

Beth makes a noise, and it takes Murphy a moment too long to realize that it’s _laughter._ “I came to see _you_ , you jerk. Your dad told me where you’d gone. Didn’t realize I was gonna walk into a goddamn _firefight_.”

She— _what_? Murphy rocks back on his heels and gives Beth a dubious look. “You came to see…me.”

Beth’s white as a sheet and wracked with fine tremors, but she still manages to pull her wobbling lips into a smile. “Sure as hell wasn’t comin’ to see _him_ ,” she says, and jerks her chin at Napoleon’s dead body. Murphy looks at what’s left of him, too, half inclined to kick his corpse, but—

But then he sees the buck knife that’s sticking out of the guy’s thigh, and he thinks back to the way he’d squealed and hunched over in pain.

He stares at Beth, and he can feel his eyebrows creeping toward his hairline. “You fucking stabbed him.”

Beth barks out an unsteady laugh. “Yeah, well. He was holding me at gunpoint, wasn’t he? Fair’s fair.”

Christ.

Jesus Christ, he really does love this girl.

“What about you?” Beth brushes her fingers across his cheek, and he shuts his eyes, nuzzles into her palm. “You okay? They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

Murphy’s skin prickles with a welcome sense of déjà vu. “Yeah,” he says, smiling lopsidedly. “Yeah, love. I’m alright.”

Beth tilts her head, smiling in a puzzled sort of way. “What’s so funny?”

Funny? Oh. “Nothing. Was just thinking of the first time you patched me and Connor up.” Beth had given them hell over it, saying that men their age had no business getting into bar brawls, but it’d been the first time she’d really touched him, too, and Murphy reckoned that made it worth the scolding.

Beth’s face softens, and her fingers curl against Murphy’s cheek. “Oh.”

Murphy smirks and tips his forehead against hers. “How about it, Nurse Beth? Want to look me over?”

Beth snorts, but before she can respond one way or the other, there’s a ruckus from over by the bar, and Murphy thinks, _Jesus Christ, what now?_

“JESUS FUCKING CHRIST.” Out of the corner of his eye, Murphy sees Amy jump and cling to Connor, who appears to’ve forgiven her for the frying pan incident, if the way he wraps his arms around her shoulders is any indication. “WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED OUT HERE?”

Murphy winces, but then Beth leans into him and presses a kiss to his cheek, and, hell. This evening might not’ve started off the best, but so long as Beth’s with him, he’s got no complaints whatsoever as to where it’s heading.

“Christ, Doc, calm down. We can explain…”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> S/O to Maj for catching my typos AND!!! guest writing several paragraphs worth of content for this chapter when I felt that my own writing wasn't enough. She wouldn't let me add her as co-author, but she can't stop me from telling you guys that this chapter's best bits were written by her.

Murphy kneels in front of the sofa and presses a mug of hot tea into Beth’s chilled hands, forehead pinching when she offers him a weak, watery smile in return. The blue-and-white afghan he tucked around her shoulders earlier has started to slide off without her noticing, and her smile gets a bit stronger, a bit more genuine, when he tugs it back into place.

“Alright there, love?” It’s a stupid fucking question and he bloody well knows it, but there’s no stifling the compulsion to ask, just as there’s no stopping himself from hovering over her with no breathing room to spare.

Maybe there was some truth to what Connor said last night, when he called Murphy a mother hen. Not that Murphy’d ever tell the gloating bastard as much.

Beth shrugs, and Murphy drags the blanket back up before it can slip all the way off again. “As good as I can be, I guess.”

“Are you freakin’ serious?” Amy pipes up. She’s sandwiched between Connor and Beth and tucked into the former’s side, clutching her own mug of tea and looking rather as if she’d like to chuck it at someone’s _head_. “Did you miss the part where we were held hostage at _gunpoint_?”

“Technically speaking,” says Connor, “Beth’s the only one who was held hostage at gunpoint.”

Amy gives Connor a look that does a decent job of suggesting where, exactly, he can shove his technicalities, but Murphy can’t help but notice that she doesn’t scoot out from under his brother’s sheltering arm, either.

Oh, Christ. Murphy doesn’t need to know Connor’s record for getting a girl into bed to accurately predict where _this_ shit’s going.

He puts that moderately disturbing development aside and pushes loose chunks of Beth’s hair behind her ears, looking her over for the hundredth fucking time since he shot down the bastard who tried to take her from him. Physically, she’s unscathed, aside from an ugly bruise on her forearm that Murphy would absolutely kill Napoleon for if the prick wasn’t already dead, but he doesn’t have to be a psychiatrist or whatever the fuck to know that trauma’s not always physical.

Jesus, he fucking wishes that he could do more for her than wrap her in a blanket and give her tea she’s not going to drink. But a cup of tea was his mam’s answer to every ill, from schoolyard scrapes to deaths in the family, and Murphy’s nothing if not a product of his upbringing.

All he can do is kill the bastards who hurt her and see that she’s looked after once the dust’s settled, and thank God in His heaven that the lot of them made it out alive.

Da was talking on the phone in the kitchen, but now the murmur of his voice cuts out, and Murphy twists around to have a look just in time to watch him walk into the den with his hands tucked into his pockets and a grave expression deepening the lines on his face.

Murphy lifts his eyebrows in silent question, and he doesn’t need to look at Connor to know that he’s doing the same. Their da nods mutely, wordlessly answering their silent question.

The bodies from the pub are all taken care of, then, courtesy of one of Noah’s many connections. That should settle Doc a bit, at least, although Connor and Murphy are still sure to catch hell for the mess the next time they see the old man. Probably won’t let them in during off hours for a good long while, but Murphy supposes that’s a fair price to pay when he thinks about what _could_ have happened.

He wraps his hand around Beth’s and squeezes, feeling only a fraction better when she squeezes back.

“I’ll be on my way, then,” says Noah, but he doesn’t take his leave quite yet. He approaches the sofa instead, kneeling far more fluidly than one might expect from a man his age, and rests his weathered hands on Beth and Amy’s knees. “Are you girls alright?”

Amy snorts, but Beth pins a fresh smile to her pretty face and offers Noah the same answer she gave Murphy a few moments ago.

“As alright as I can be. Thanks for lookin’ out for us, Noah.”

“Think nothing of it, dear.” Noah pats Beth’s hand, then stands as gracefully as he knelt, not a popped joint to be heard. His smile is warm, but his eyes are cold enough to give even Murphy a bit of a chill.

Lucky for those mafiosos that Connor and Murphy took them out before their father could get to them. Lucky, indeed.

But then Noah blinks, and the ice in his eyes melts. “Coming along, boys? Or would you rather keep our girls company for a little while longer?”

 _Our girls_. Murphy rather likes the sound of that, even if he didn’t sign up for Amy. But if Connor fancies the girl who concussed him with a frying pan—which, bloody typical—well, at least she can take care of herself.

He thinks back to the buck knife he retrieved from Napoleon’s thigh before ushering Beth out of McGinty’s and has to bite back a grin. Yeah. Amy’s not the only one, is she?

He looks at Beth. “Alright if we stay a bit longer?”

Beth starts nodding before he’s finished asking, then catches herself and blushes, possibly embarrassed at her own eagerness. She shouldn’t be, though. She’s got to know that whatever she wants from him, it’s hers.

“Um,” she says. “If y’all don’t mind?”

“Nah.” Connor chafes his hand against Amy’s forearm as if he can somehow soothe away the goosebumps she’s been sporting since they left McGinty’s. “Don’t reckon Murph here would mind at all.”

 _Prick._ “Speak for your fucking self,” Murphy retorts, then settles in the face of Noah’s repressive frown. Ah. Right. Gentlemanly old bastard doesn’t want them cursing in front of _ladies_.

Funny, where their father chooses to draw his lines.

Noah doesn’t ask Connor and Murphy to see him to the door—probably knows that Murphy, at least, won’t want to leave Beth’s side if he can fucking help it—just nods and ruffles his sons’ hair, making them both grumble.

“Alright, then. I’ll see you boys in the morning.” To Beth and Amy he says, “Have a good night, dears.”

“’Night,” Beth and Amy chime, voices overlapping like they’re singing in a choir, and Noah slips out of the room, silent as a shadow. Murphy doesn’t even hear it when he opens and shuts the door, but that’s typical. His father wouldn’t be much of an assassin if he made a fucking racket wherever he went, would he?

Murphy rises from his crouch and drops onto the sofa beside Beth, relaxing bit by bit when she leans into his side, when he feels her warmth and her weight and the tickle of her long hair against his collarbones. He presses his mouth to the top of her head and sighs out through his nose, not giving a fuck about their audience. He trusts that Connor won’t run his mouth right now, at least, and he doesn’t.

Amy, though—still turns out _she_ still has quite a fuck of a lot to say.

“So does this make us, like, accomplices?”

Connor barks out a laugh, and even Murphy’s startled into sniggering, too. Never a dull moment with these girls, is there?

“Not you, love,” says Connor. “Our Beth, though—she just might qualify, mightn’t she?”

Beth lifts her head off Murphy’s shoulder. “What? Why me?”

Connor reaches across Amy to flick Beth on the nose, and Murphy swats at him before Beth can bother to try. Instead of retaliating, Connor just shakes out his hand, grins, and says, “Fucking stabbed the wee bastard in the leg, didn’t you? Gave Murph here a chance to take the shot.”

Beth blinks, then frowns down at her lap, chafing a thumb against her mug of cooling tea. “Oh.”

Murphy frowns, too, and gives Beth a reassuring squeeze. “Was right fucking clever, what you did. Arsehole didn’t even see it coming.”

Beth rolls her eyes at him, but at least she no longer looks quite so lost inside herself. “Thanks, I guess.”

“I’m gonna have to ask Andrea what does and doesn’t count as aiding and abetting,” Amy says, more to herself than any of them. “Hypothetically, I mean.”

“Amy’s big sister is a lawyer,” Beth explains.

“We could probably get off on self-defense charges if it came down to it,” Amy says, then lifts her index finger and stabs it at Murphy like the business end of a knife. “But only if we reported it to the police right away.”

“Do you _want_ to report it to the police?” Beth asks.

“Hell no,” Amy says, and takes a large swig of tea.

“Well,” says Connor. “That’s that, then, innit?”

Murphy nods and slumps back against the sofa, fingers catching in the afghan’s loose weave. He’s got half a mind to grab the remote and flip through the pitiful selection of television programs that’re on at this hour, but he gets sidetracked when Beth sets her mug down on the coffee table and stands up, pinching the afghan closed and wearing it like a cloak. 

“I’m, uh.” Beth shuffles her feet when all eyes turn on her. “I’m gonna turn in for the night, I guess.”

Murphy sits up straight. Connor’ll get a right kick out of this, but fuck it. Beth means more to him than his pride. “Want me to come with you?”

Connor snorts right on cue, but Murphy doesn’t bother hitting him. If Beth wants him to keep her company, he will. If she wants him to fuck off and leave her be, he’ll do that, too. He won’t like it, but he’ll do it.

Whatever she wants.

Beth flushes and looks at the floor, then nods. “Um, yeah. Yeah, I’d like that. If you’re sure you want to.”

Murphy’s already standing up. “Wouldn’t’ve offered if I didn’t.”

He wraps an arm around Beth and leads her toward the bedrooms, lip curling when Connor says, “Just keep it down, you two, alright?”

Murphy flips Connor off over his shoulder. “Only if you do,” he says, and shuts the door on Connor’s answering laugh.

Fucking prick.

“So, um.” Beth sits at the foot of her bed, still cocooned in that afghan. “Am I the only one who’s a little weirded out, here?” 

Murphy joins her, picking up her hand and intertwining their fingers. “You get used to it,” he says.

Beth wrinkles her nose. “Not—not what happened back at the bar. I mean, that was definitely—a lot. But I was talkin’ about Connor and Amy.”

“How d’you mean?”

Beth looks at him like he just spoke Irish. “She nearly _killed_ him this mornin’.”

“Ah, well. Connor likes a woman who can kick his arse.” He tips a grin her way, tongue peeking out from between his teeth. “Got that much in common, don’t we?”

Beth shakes her head at him, but she’s smiling, too, and it even looks genuine. “Uh-huh, well, you’ll be singin’ a different tune when Amy comes to me to compare _notes_.”

“All she needs to know is that my cock’s bigger than his.” He gives the bedroom door a contemplative look. “Reckon she’s about to find out for herself.”

Beth groans and flops backwards onto the bed, afghan falling open. “Jeez, Murphy, really?” She scrubs her hands down her face as if to wipe away her grimace. “Thought you said you coulda done _without_ her knowin’ what your…thingie looks like.”

“ _Thingie_?” Murphy echoes, an honest-to-God _cackle_ tearing out of his throat, and Beth groans again and rolls over onto her stomach.

He stretches out beside her and cushions his cheek on his folded arms, grinning fondly at the red tip of her ear. “It’s true, though. Mine’s bigger.”

Beth muffles a snort. “Yeah, okay. Good to know, I guess.”

“Good for you, anyway.”

Beth pushes up onto her elbows and shakes her hair out of her face, the better to roll her eyes at him. “You’re a pain in my butt, y’know that?”

He could tease her a bit more, but he finds he’d rather be honest with her, especially after coming so close to losing her. So he shrugs, trying for casual, and runs a hand down the gentle curve of her spine. “So long as I’m yours.” 

Beth’s wry smile falls off her face, expression turning pensive. Shit, did he say too much? And now she’s standing up—Christ, did he scare her off?—but she doesn’t go for the door, veering off toward the dresser and rooting around its surface before coming back a moment later with something clutched in her hand.

She settles down cross-legged and uncurls her fingers, and a lump forms in Murphy’s throat when he sees what she’s got.

He pushes up to sit, too. Clears his throat. “You kept it.”

Beth looks at him oddly. “Well, yeah. What’d you think I was gonna do with it?”

He shrugs again and pastes on a smile that likely doesn’t reach his eyes. “Reckoned you’d chucked it in a dumpster somewhere, tell you the truth.”

Her face crumples into a frown. “I would never do somethin’ like that.”

Yeah, well. “Wouldn’t’ve blamed you if you had.”

The look Beth gives him is profoundly sad, and it makes him ache right under his breastbone. It’s an abject fucking relief when she breaks eye contact to flip open the small velvet box and pull out the ring he tried to give her earlier, holding it in the palm of her hand.

It’s smaller than his, more delicately made to suit her fine bone structure, with a dainty band formed out of trinity knots that’d helped him to settle on this one. What really drew him to it, though, was the color—a warm rose gold that recalled the yellow in her hair and the pink in her cheeks.

“Y’know,” Beth says, “my dad gave my mom one’a these.”

Murphy’s ears perk, and he tries not to sound too overeager when he prompts her for more. “Yeah?”

Beth’s smile has a melancholy slant to it. “Yeah.” She tilts her head and squints like she’s trying to suss something out. “Y’know, I used to think that you were just messin’ around whenever you hit on me, and now you’re forkin’ over a ring. It’s kinda givin’ me whiplash.”

Murphy didn’t really hear anything past _I used to think you were just messin’ around._ “Say that again.”

Beth blinks at him. Once, twice. “I…thought you were just messin’ around?”

So he didn’t hear her wrong, after all. “What in God’s fucking name gave you that idea?”

“I dunno. You just seemed like the type to flirt with everybody. I didn’t think you were after anythin’ serious.”

Well. That explains why it took her so fucking long to respond to his blatant interest with anything more substantial than a good-natured eyeroll. Murphy takes a moment to adjust to this, then says, gruff but honest, “Never used to be.”

Beth’s face softens all at once. “Oh,” she says.

Yeah. Fucking _oh_.

Murphy scrubs at his probably bloodshot eyes. Christ, he’s fucking knackered, and likely hangover bound. “Listen,” he says haltingly, “you don’t have to wear it if you don’t—”

 _Want to_ , was what he was going to say, but the words get lost somewhere between his throat and his tongue when Beth sets the box aside and slips the claddagh onto her right ring finger, heart pointing toward her wrist.

Oh.

Well, then.

She slides her fingers across his, tracing his own ring’s heavy band. “You’re wearing one, too,” she says, quiet and pleased, and Murphy snorts.

“’Course I fucking am. No point to it if it’s only you who’s wearing one, is there?”

Her eyes crease into pretty half moons when she smiles. “Want everyone to know you’re taken, Mr. MacManus?”

Instead of complaining about her cheek—because she’s right, isn’t she?—Murphy just brings her hand to his mouth and kisses the ring that rides her finger, feeling truly at peace for the first time since he dropped her off after mass.

Just. Thank God. Thank fucking God for bringing this girl into his life. Thank God for allowing him to keep her.

Beth runs her fingers through his hair and presses a kiss to the top of his head, and they sit like that for a while till she straightens up and says, apropos of fucking nothing, “You wanna know why I came to Boston?”

Fuck, yes, he does, but he doesn’t want her to turn skittish, so he does his best to play it cool.

“Said it was different from where you used to be, right? Wanted a change of pace or something like that?”

“Somethin’ like that.”

She’s gone back to being sad, and there’s not a fucking thing Murphy can do about it. Whatever’s troubling her, it’s not something he can take care of in his usual way.

Jesus Christ, what fucking good is he if he can’t look after her emotional needs as well as her physical ones?

Beth doesn’t seem too concerned with his shortcomings, though. No, the look on her face is thoughtful, turned inward. Lost, almost. Her fingers twitch against his, and she smiles when he holds her hand tighter. It’s a fleeting expression, though, running away from her face almost as soon as it dawned there.

“My mom and my big brother Shawn, they, uh. They passed away a few years back. Car crash.”

Murphy’s hand tightens around hers. “Christ, girl, I’m sorry.” It’s inadequate as fuck, but it’s better than saying nothing at all, isn’t it? He’s fucking got to give her _something_.

“Thanks,” Beth says, and she even seems to mean it. “Really. And it’s just—if they’d gotten sick or somethin’, that would’ve been awful, too. But at least we woulda seen it comin’, right? At least I coulda had some time to get ready for it, but—no one’s ever really ready for stuff like this, are they? I mean, it happens all the time, right, but it’s always happening to other people, not—not _your_ people.”

Murphy thinks of Rocco bleeding out beside him on Yakavetta’s floor, of how he couldn’t even put pressure on his wounds because he’d had his hands lashed behind his fucking back.

He sweeps his thumb across Beth’s knuckles. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, girl, I know what you mean.”

Beth swallows thickly. “Yeah, well, the thing is, I—I didn’t take it all that well.”

“Don’t think anyone ever takes it very well, love.”

Her fingers twitch again, like she’d be fiddling with her bracelets if not for his hand holding hers. “Some people take it better than others. I, uh. I had to stay at the hospital for a while after it—after it happened.”

Murphy’s eyebrows pull together. “Were you in the car when it happened?”

“Oh, no. No, I was at school. Um.” Beth breaks eye contact and drags her lower lip between her teeth, hesitating a moment before untangling their fingers and sliding her bracelets off her wrist, leaving them in a pile beside the ring box.

Murphy doesn’t understand what she’s doing. Not at first. Not until she flips her hand over to show him the underside of her wrist, and even then, he _still_ doesn’t fucking get it until his brain finally manages to process just what the fuck he’s seeing.

It’s a scar. He’s seen them before; has a fair few of his own. This one’s a jagged, vertical slash that cuts Beth’s pretty wrist in half like an uneven demarcation line, and it looks several years old.

Retroactive dread flushes through Murphy and leaves him chilled to the fucking bone, because he knows what this scar means.

It means he could’ve lost her before he ever got to know her.

Beth’s fingers curl against her palm. “I, um. Couldn’t go through with it. Obviously. Maggie—that’s my big sister—she, uh. She drove me to the hospital. I scared the shit outta her.” She breathes out an unsteady laugh, but there’s no real humor in it. “That’s why I left, I guess. I couldn’t. I couldn’t be there anymore. Where it all happened. I needed to get away for awhile.”

Murphy gropes for something to say, but what the fuck can he say? He’s never been where Beth was. Yeah, losing Rocco fucking devastated him, but he had an outlet for that, didn’t he? He brought the bastard who murdered him in cold fucking blood to justice.

“Lemme guess,” Beth says, tone deliberately light in a way that suggests she’s feeling anything but. “You’re gonna tell me that suicide’s a sin, right?”

Murphy does no such fucking thing. What he does is wrap his hand around her wrist, gentle, and sweep his fingers across that ridge of scar tissue before kissing it with as much reverence as he kissed her ring.

Her breath stutters, twitching fingers grazing his cheek. He lifts his head to look at her, and what he sees leaves him as awed as if he’d just glimpsed the face of God.

She swallows, and he watches the pull of muscles in her throat with avaricious eyes. “Y’know,” she says, “I still dunno how I feel about what y’all’re doin’.”

He doesn’t need to ask her to clarify. “But you feel better about it now than you did before. Don’t you?”

Beth flips her hand over to hold his, thumb worrying at his knuckles. “Those guys from earlier…it’s like you said, y’know? The system’s corrupt. People get life sentences on nonviolent drug charges while guys like that go free ’cause they’ve got power and connections. It ain’t right.”

Her face and voice grow fiercer as she talks, fingers clenching tight around his—and he’s definitely gonna be feeling that shit later; girl’s got a bloody good grip—before loosening abruptly. She meets his eyes, hers hot and bright.

“I don’t condone violence, and I ain’t advocating for murder. But I can’t say I’m sorry about what you did to those guys.”

He gives her an approving nod, ferocious pride washing through him. That’s his girl: too fucking good to ever really be at peace with even the most righteous of executions, but wise enough to understand the necessity of what he and his family do.

“Thanks,” he says, clearing his throat when his voice comes out huskier than he intended. “For, er. For thinking it over.” For—shit. For giving him a second chance.

Her lips twist into a wry smile. “Don’t thank me just yet. This means you’re stuck with me, y’know? Might end up regretting that.”

“Not in a million fucking years,” he says, dead fucking serious, and Beth’s ironic smile breaks apart on a clear, delighted laugh.

“What’m I gonna do with you, huh?”

“Got a fair few ideas,” he says, fingers moving restlessly against hers now. “Fancy hearing any of ’em?”

Beth shakes her head at him, but she’s still smiling. Blushing a bit now, too, and when she looks at him from under her curly lashes and parts her pink lips, he leans, expecting to be met with a kiss.

And he is, after a fashion. Just not with the sort of kiss he’d anticipated.

Her lips land on his throat. On the side of his neck. Right over his tattoo, come to think of it, for all that thinking’s a bit of a fucking struggle just now. She keeps them pressed there for a moment as if she’s testing the waters, then parts them all at once, warm breath buffeting his jumping pulse, tongue slicking a filthy wet stripe across his skin.

_Oh, fuck._

He tangles his fingers in her ponytail and smooths his other hand down her back to clutch at the curve of her arse, desperate to get her on top of him, underneath of him, he doesn’t fucking give a shit so long as he can eliminate every inch of space that dares to come between them. And she must be feeling at least a little of that desperation, too, because she’s quick to straddle him, eager and clumsy and burning hot, adhering her wet little mouth to his neck and giving a long, hard suck that he swears he can feel on the head of his cock.

But she’s got to breathe eventually, doesn’t she, and it’s only a moment later that she pulls off his neck with a damp, dirty pop, pressing her smile against the bruise she left behind.

“I like your tattoos,” she tells him, combing her fingers through his hair and scratching her nails against his scalp in a way that gets his eyes crossing, as if the pressure of her cunt through her jeans wasn’t enough to get the job done, _Christ_.

“Thank the good fucking Lord for that,” he manages. _Barely_ fucking manages, and it comes out sounding strangled, anyway.

“Is this, uh.” Beth presses a hard kiss to his fluttering pulse, then rocks back far enough to look him fleetingly in the eye before focusing on her own fingers as they fiddle with the rosary beads that peek out from under his shirt’s collar. “Is this okay? D’you wanna—”

Murphy doesn’t let her finish. “Christ, girl.” He squeezes her arse and tugs on her ponytail. “D’you really need to fucking ask?”

Beth huffs at him. “I was just makin’ _sure_ , jeez.”

“Yeah? That’s right considerate of you, love.”

She shoves lightly at his shoulder. “Shut up.”

“Don’t you give me any cheek, now.”

“Yeah?” She nudges her nose against his jaw, giggles. “Or what?”

Well, she asked.

He taps her on the arse, not hard, barely enough force to make her jump. She still squirms, though, grinding that hot cunt of hers up and down the stiff line of his cock and giving him all sorts of ideas about what she could be doing if their fucking clothes weren’t in the way.

But before he can flip her over, yank down her jeans, and get to spanking her arse in earnest, she says, “D’you think they’ll hear us?”

 _They_? What the fuck is she—oh. Right. “Fuck, who cares?”

“ _I_ do.”

Murphy smirks, walks his fingers down her spine just to feel her shiver. “You’ll just have to keep quiet, then, won’t you?”

Beth bites down on her lower lip, but there’s no masking her smile. “Thought you liked me loud.”

Christ, is she trying to fucking kill him? “Aye, I sure the fuck do.” He tugs on her ponytail again, hard enough to jerk her head back on her neck so he can lick up the long white line of her throat, leaving behind a shimmering trail of spit and a scratchy flush of beard burn. “Makes no difference to me whether they hear us or not. You don’t want ’em to know what’s going on in here, that’s on you.”

Her cheeks bloom pink, pupils eclipsing the blue of her eyes even as her mischievous smile lingers. “Bossing me around again, huh?”

“Want to lodge a complaint, d’you?”

She shakes her head, slow and deliberate. “Nah.” Her hands sneak under his shirt, quick fingers tickling his abdomen and scraping through the hair on his chest. Her ring feels blissfully cool against his overheated skin. “I’ll be a good girl for you, Daddy.” 

It’s like a bullet fired from a gun, what she just said to him, what it _does_ to him, the way it hits him square between the fucking eyes, and he moves before his brain can catch up with his actions, pushing her out of his lap and getting her flat on her back, pinning her wrists above her head, palm pressed flush to that old scar. He drives his hips down against her stomach to give her a good feel for what exactly the fuck she’s doing to him, because she _said_ she’s gonna be a good girl for him, but good girls don’t push every last one of his buttons on fucking _purpose_.

“Jesus fucking Christ, girl.” He shifts his hips and ruts against her inseam, leans in to pluck a hot, wet kiss off her smiling mouth. “Want me to go off early, d’you? That what you’re angling for?”

She giggles, high and breathless, but that giggle chokes off around a moan when he hits her just right. “Why—why’d I wanna do that? Said I’d be a good girl for you, didn’t I?”

“Said you would, aye.” Christ, she’s got too many fucking clothes on. He lets go of her wrists and sits back on his haunches, thighs hugging her slim hips, and gets to tearing those clothes _off_ as quickly as fucking possible. “And yet here you fucking are, acting the fuck up.”

Her hair crackles with arcs of static when he yanks her jumper off, and she pushes up on one elbow to shove it out of her eyes as he gropes for her bra’s clasp. She bumps her leg against his thigh and says in that sweet southern drawl of hers, “You wanna do somethin’ ’bout it, Daddy?”

Swear to God, if his abdomen clenches any harder, he’s gonna get a fucking cramp. “Would,” he grunts, still fumbling at the plastic bane of his existence, “if I could get this stupid fucking thing _off_.”

Not that it’d be a real tragedy if he couldn’t; he doesn’t need to take her bra off to fuck her. But he _wants_ her naked, wants the long lean length of her pressed flush against him without anything in the way, just her tits and her thighs and her warm wet cunt hugging his aching cock. 

Beth sits the rest of the way up and bats his hands aside. “If you wind up breakin’ my bra, you’re buyin’ me a new one, y’hear?”

Is that what it’d take for her to let him buy her new things? “Fair enough.”

Beth shakes her head and rolls her eyes, then pulls off a maneuver he’s seen before, sliding her bra’s straps down her arms and twisting the band around to undo the clasp from the front.

“Clever,” he says. “Can you do that without taking your shirt off as well?”

“Don’t be annoying,” she says, flinging her discarded bra off into parts unknown and uncared for. She goes for her fly, but Murphy shakes his head and peels off his own shirt before taking care of it himself, stripping her down to nothing but her cotton knickers.

Her bra was off-white, but her knickers are pink like her jumper, topped with a crinkly little bow like she’s a present waiting to be unwrapped, and saliva pools up thick beneath Murphy’s tongue just from looking at her.

_Don’t mind if I fucking do._

Beth tilts her head at him. “Huh?”

Said that out loud, did he? “Nothing,” he says, and folds his hands over her smooth shoulders to ease her onto her back, crawling down the length of her body till his face’s poised over that enticing pink bow.

Her legs are crooked open, but he smooths his hands up her thighs, peach fuzz tickling the pads of his fingers, and palms them even farther apart till he can get a good look at the dark stain spreading across her crotch and soaking through the pink cotton. He grunts and squeezes himself through his jeans, then fumbles his zip down one-handed.

“Can’t fucking believe you’re this wet already.” He lies down on his stomach and traces the tip of his nose up her inner thigh, following the musk coming off her cunt like a bloodhound on a scent. “Bet you could take my cock right now, couldn’t you? Wouldn’t even have to stretch you out first, would I?”

“ _Ngh_.” Beth’s thighs twitch against his face when he says that, then twitch again when he presses his open mouth to her crotch and breathes hot across damp, sticky cotton. She tangles her fingers in his hair and says, “Yeah—yeah, Murphy, I can take it. Give it to me right now, c’mon, I want it, _I want it_.”

Lord’s fucking name, his eyes nearly roll back in his fucking head when he hears her pleading with him like that, and it’s all he can do not to immediately give her exactly what she wants. Lucky for him that he wants to eat her out even more than he wants to fuck her, or else he’d’ve had her thigh slung over his hip before she could finish begging him for it.

“Nah-ah.” Beth whines at his refusal, then whines even louder when he licks a dirty wet stripe up her crotch, molding his tongue to the puffy outline of her cunt. “Gonna eat you out first. Been wanting to get my mouth on this cunt again, girl, don’t try and fucking distract me.”

“You just—” His scruff tickles her inner thigh, and she inhales hard through her nose, half giggling. “You just did yesterday.”

“Yeah?” He lips at her through her underwear, squeezes her hips. “That’s twenty-four hours too long.”

And in the spirit of not wasting another single fucking second on anything that isn’t eating her out till she strangles him with her thighs, he scrapes his teeth across her stomach and bites down on the little pink bow that’s driven him half out of his head, saliva waterfalling out of his mouth to soak into the cotton like her come’s soaking her crotch, feeling her abdominal muscles tense and ripple like she’s already on the brink of orgasm.

He pushes her legs flat against the mattress and tugs on the bow he’s got clasped between his teeth, easing her knickers down an inch, then another. Her breath hitches when she catches on to what he’s doing, fingers tightening in his hair, and she lifts her hips to ease the way.

Being real cooperative, she is. He appreciates that shit.

He uses his mouth to pull her underwear down as far as her knees, then rocks back on his heels and yanks them the rest of the way off with his hands, crushing them in his fist and pressing them to his face so he can inhale the smell of her come through his open, panting mouth.

Yeah. Fuck it. He’s keeping these, and he doesn’t fucking care if it makes him a bloody degenerate. That’s what confession’s for, innit?

For now, though, he drops her knickers off to one side and shoulders in between her legs, palming her hips and lapping up a shimmering trail of come that’s dripped as far as the crease of her thigh. Fuck, she goes down like good whiskey, warm and heady and lingering, and he knows for a fucking fact that he’ll never get enough of her for as long as he lives.

“ _God_ , c’mon.” He gives her clit a fleeting lick, and she tugs on his hair hard enough to sting. “C’mon, Murphy, please—”

She doesn’t need to ask him twice.

Her swollen pussy lips are filmed over with a thick layer of come and a gleaming trace of spit, and they make an obscene, tacky noise when he peels them apart to get a look at the dark little hollow of her cunt, sheer white strands clinging and breaking like threads of silk. He wipes them out with a long hard lash of his tongue, and Beth shrieks and squirms beneath him, heels tapping his spine and digging in when he fucks into her with his fingers, muscles jumping under the palm he presses to her stomach the way they’d jumped under his teeth earlier.

Fuck him, but if he thought he’d committed the taste and feel of her to memory, it pales before hot, sticky reality as she melts beneath his tongue like a sugar cube and drips wet all over his face, ripe as a fresh fucking peach. And she was wet when he started in on her, yeah, but not wet enough for his liking. No, he’s not gonna fucking let up till she’s nice and loose and dripping down both legs.

“C’mon, sweetheart.” He spreads his fingers, spreads her apart, laps at her clit like a hungry mutt till her muscles seize up around him like a fist. “Be a good girl and come for me, alright? Wanna feel it, Beth. Want you to come on my fucking face, c’mon.”

“ _OhmyGod_.” Her toes curl, her cunt flexes, her breath crests into a whine—a whine that goes abruptly, disappointingly muffled within the next second.

What the fuck?

He glances up the length of her body, past her trembling stomach and rosy nipples and toward her flushed face, irritation rising when he finds that she’s got a hand clamped tightly over her mouth. Just what the fuck does she think she’s doing, choking off the sounds he’s worked so hard to pull out of her?

But then she sinks her teeth into her knuckle, and it clicks. _You’ll just have to keep quiet, then, won’t you?_

And, yeah, he _said_ that, but he doesn’t actually _want_ her to be quiet. She wasn’t supposed to take it _literally_.

Fuck Connor and Amy. If they’ve got a problem with him making Beth moan, then they can see themselves the fuck out. No one’s _making_ them stay. 

He pulls off her cunt with a damp pop, teasing her clit with the very tip of his tongue till she moans softly and pulls on his hair. “What’s wrong, sweetheart?” He pulls his fingers halfway out of her, then pushes them back in, her pussy sucking him down like a parched throat. “Not giving it to you good enough, is that it? You’re usually a right side louder than this.”

“M's’posed to— _God_.” He takes a long, indulgent draw on her clit, sucking hard through pursed lips like he’s trying to pull a thick milkshake up through a narrow straw, and her hips lift clear off the bed. “M’s’posed to be quiet, ain’t I?”

“You’re the one who didn’t want ’em to overhear.” He pulls off her clit to breathe hot across her cunt, and she flexes around his fingers, muffles another whine. “I couldn’t give a fuck. _I_ wanna fucking hear you.”

He gives one harsh, hot lick up her slit to get her going. Gets _himself_ going, too, blood pounding in his cock so he’s got to rut into the mattress to give himself room to think beyond the humid musk coming off her pussy. 

“You gonna give that to Daddy, aren’t you?” Murphy rasps out, gaze locked on her warm pink face, bright dark eyes. “C’mon, Beth. Daddy wants to hear you scream.”

He sucks once more on her clit, tastes the way her whole body shudders when he talks to her like that. But she’s still gonna fight him on this, ‘course she fucking is. 

“But— _ungh_.” She squeezes him harder, and he can feel the ghost of that pressure on his cock, leaking like a busted tap in his shorts. “Amy won’t—Amy won’t ever let me live it down—”

“ _Hmmm_.” He hums against her clit, and it gets her squirming so hard he has to pin her hips to the bed or risk a black eye. Not that it wouldn’t be worth it. “Bet she’s not even paying us any attention. Connor’s probably keeping her busy.”

“I don’t—” He glances up at her and watches her hand slip down her chin. Her cunt clenches hard, then clenches again. “—wanna think about that—right now—”

Wouldn’t be thinking about anything but his mouth on her cunt if he was doing his job right. So he _does it right_ , stops talking to her to concentrate on eating her out like a last meal served on death row, going at her with an open mouth and a ravenous tongue, groaning into her pussy so he can make her body shake some more, and just because he can’t fucking help himself, can he? He licks into her, has to palm his cock to calm it the fuck down for a minute—two minutes, maybe, till he’s drooling all over her and then she’s drooling all over _him_. Her breathless little grunts mount into a choked-off scream, just as he fucking _wanted_ , and she shivers and shakes beneath him, cunt throbbing like an old bruise, come gushing out of her to soak his beard.

He nurses her through it, gentle, till she tugs on his hair the way she had the first time he ate her out. He raises his head and licks his lips, easing his fingers out of her flexing cunt and then licking those, too, not wanting a single drop of her come to go to waste.

Her thigh spasms against his cheek as an aftershock rocks through her, and he smooths his palm down the length of it, soothing her. “Still thinking about it?”

Beth blinks up at the ceiling, eyes out of focus, cheeks flushed splotchy pink. “Thinkin’ about what?”

He presses his grin to her inner thigh, swipes his tongue across her skin just to feel her twitch again. “Can I fuck you now?” 

Another spasm rocks through her. “ _God_ ,” she says. “Yeah. Yeah, Murphy, you can. C’mon, get up here.”

“Thought I was supposed to be giving the orders here,” he says, but it’s only a tease, and he’s already doing as she said, anyway, kicking off his boots and shoving down his jeans, searching rather frantically for a condom and privately thanking God when he finds that he’s still got one left, after all.

Beth pushes up on her elbows and cocks her head at him, eyes flickering from his face to his prick and back again. “Did you just cross yourself?”

Did he? “Did I?”

“Uh, yeah.” He rolls the condom on, and she nudges his thigh with her pink polished toes. “You always do that right before sex?”

As a matter of fact, he doesn’t. He pushes her knees farther apart and lies down in the cradle of her thighs, cock dragging down her belly to nestle in the soft sticky cleft of her cunt, cupping her precious face in his hands and kissing her as sweetly as he knows how. “Only if the girl I’m with is a God-given miracle.”

Beth shifts her hips and drags her heel up the back of his calf. She’s smiling at him, but the hand she fists in his hair feels a bit like a warning. “You sleep with a lotta miracles, Mr. MacManus?”

“Just the one,” he promises her. He drags his hand up her thigh, hitches it up and hooks it around his hip. “Gonna let me fuck you now, sweetheart?”

“Been waitin’ for you to,” she says, and he groans and crushes his mouth to hers, only for his jaw to go slack when she wrestles him over onto his back, crawling on top of him and straddling his hips.

She breaks the kiss, lips swollen and red and slick with spit, and sits back on her haunches, cunt catching against his cockhead and making him go cross eyed. It’s a struggle to speak at all, let alone coherently, but, somehow, he manages.

“And just what the fuck d’you think you’re doing?” he asks, same as he had their first night together, and he sees it in her face when she remembers it, too.

She shrugs her delicate shoulders, shifting her hips in a way that _could_ be accidental and almost certainly fucking isn’t.

“Thought I’d see if you’d let me be on top _this_ time.” She rakes her fingertips down his stomach, lower, nails scratching through his pubic hair. “Got a problem with that, Daddy?”

She blushes when she calls him that, far too shy for a girl who’s rutting her cunt against his cock, slick and soft as a drooling mouth, and fuck if he doesn’t nearly come right then.

“Got a problem with that fucking cheek of yours,” he says, even though he really doesn’t, even though he gets off on it more than anything. He slaps her on the arse, and she jolts, rocking forward so his cock’s pinned between her cunt and his stomach.

And Beth can see right through him, same as she always has, because she smiles breathlessly and says, “I don’t think you do, though.”

He smacks her on the arse again—not that it’s much of a punishment, given how much she likes it, how it makes her blush and squeal. He digs his fingers into firm muscle and lifts her with one hand, angling his dick with the other.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he mutters, rough with desperation and fucking _gagging for it_ , “c’mon, girl, get on my cock.”

But even with a handful of her arse and his cockhead pulsing against her wet, open entrance, he still waits for her to make that final move, to brace her strong thighs and shake her golden hair out of her face and ease herself onto his dick, slow but never stopping, never pausing for breath, cunt rippling around him as she adjusts to the stretch.

Murphy’s abdomen tenses as he beats back his orgasm. _Fuck_. God fucking forgive him, but she looks like a pagan goddess on top of him, like Aphrodite rising from the foam, and if she asked him to, he’d worship at her feet.

Leave it to this girl to make a heathen out of him.

Beth braces her hands on his sweaty shoulders and leans forward, strands of hair sticking to her cheeks, face a picture of concern even as her cunt pluses reflexively around his cock. “You— _Jesus_ —you alright?” 

“Fuck, yeah.” He digs his heels into the bed, thighs bumping Beth’s arse. In his periphery, he can see the ring box and Beth’s bracelets bounce across the rolling mattress. “C’mon, girl, get moving. Wanna watch you ride my cock.”

He bucks his hips to urge her along, and she’s so slippery fucking wet that she nearly slides right off, and probably _would_ have if not for his firm, possessive clasp on her waist dragging her back down till her pussy lips split wide open around the dark root of his cock. She shudders and squeezes him tight, still more reflexive than deliberate, but his body doesn’t know the difference between reflex and teasing, and his hips thrust in reaction, nearly sending her toppling again.

“ _Fuck_.” He fucks into her a third time, and she digs in with her fingers, steadies herself on braced knees. “C’mon, Beth. Want to be my good girl, don’t you? Be a good girl and fuck me, sweetheart, c’mon.”

“I don’t—” Another rolling thrust of his hips, another few seconds of Beth scrambling not to fall off his dick. “Gimme a minute, okay, I’ve never— _God_ —I’ve never done it like this before, Jesus.”

“You’re the one who wanted it on top, weren’t you?” But he guides her hips into a slow roll, cunt squelching with the movement, shows her how to fuck herself forward and back on his cock, building toward a rhythm that makes his toes fucking curl. “C’mon, that’s it, that’s a good girl. You like it like this, sweetheart? C’mon, tell me.”

“Yeah— _God_.” He smacks her arse, and she yelps and squirms, abdomen rippling. “Yeah, Daddy, I— _fuck_.”

Fuck, there it is. There’s the filth only he can get her to spew.

“Fuck, yeah, you do.” He thrusts up and hits her deep, chasing a single-minded obsession to just burrow himself in her as far as he fucking can and stay there. “Fucking knew you would, knew you could be bad for me if I asked. C’mon, girl, wanna feel you come on my cock, c’mon.”

“Need you to touch me,” she says, words slurring toward incoherence, nails biting red half moons into his skin like fresh tattoos. Her arse smacks against his pelvis, the obscene sounds of sex echoing in his buzzing ears. “Ain’t as good when I do it, c’mon, Daddy, _please_.”

“Don’t have to beg me, girl,” he says, _groans_ , because, yeah, he fucking loves it when she begs for him—if he weren’t inching towards that hangover, he’d probably make her give him a little more, but— _but_ , he loves making her come all over herself more than the rest of it. He presses a hand to her lower abdomen, thumbs at her slick, hard clit. “I’ll give you anything you want, sweetheart, just got to ask. C’mon, Beth, you’re almost there, can fucking feel it, so fucking hot for me, _come on_.”

“I— _ah_.” It leaves her in a hard puff of air, that one syllable that’s not even a real word, as she locks up around him and screws her eyes shut, shuddering all over and pulsing into an orgasm that clamps down on him like a fist and pulls his come out of his dick in a sudden hot burst, and a strangled shout of her name from his panting mouth.

And if he thought she was beautiful when she sat on his cock, that’s nothing next to the way she looks when she comes, eyes shut and mouth open like she just heard the voice of God, like she’s in the throes of revelation.

He’s willing to bet he looks the same. 

Her tensed muscles relax all at once, then, and she oozes forward onto his chest, cunt still pulsing sullenly around his softening cock, panting hot and wet against his throat while he runs trembling hands up and down her back.

Eventually, she mumbles, “I got a bad feelin’ that I’m gonna walk into the kitchen tomorrow mornin’ and run into Amy wearing nothin’ but Connor’s shirt.”

Murphy muffles his snigger in her sweat-matted hair. “Better than running into Connor wearing nothing at all, innit?”

He feels her forehead scrunch against his shoulder. “...Does that happen a lot?”

“Often enough.”

She pushes up on her elbows to look him in the face, tracing idle patterns on his skin. The ring he gave her gleams on her finger, proof that he’s not a complete fuck up, after all. “And you don’t care that I might accidentally see your brother naked?”

He shrugs and stretches, lazy and contented as a housecat. “I’m not opposed to you seeing for yourself that I’ve got the bigger cock, no.”

She smacks him on the chest, and it only stings a bit. “You’re the worst, y’know that?”

He grins at her. “S’pose I am. And you’re stuck with me, aren’t you?”

Her exaggerated scowl softens, and she leans forward to press her lips sweetly to his. He leans right along with her, into her, to kiss her back. Cups her cheek, spears his fingers into her mussed hair and feels a few loose strands catch in his ring.

Fuck. _Fuck_ , he loves her. And by some God-given miracle, he gets to fucking _keep_ her.

“Yeah,” she says, “guess I am.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've read this far, you have my unending love and gratitude for indulging me and my crackship. I haven't been having an easy time of it lately, but this fic has consistently remained a bright spot, and I hope it's brought you some measure of escapism as well. It means a lot to me that you're here. 
> 
> And don't forget to read the [prequel](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22919062/chapters/54783523)! 
> 
> 💚 Gus


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